Greensphere Capital, a leading specialist investment adviser, has raised £66.3 million in conditional capital for its Gaia Sciences Innovation fund. This will be invested into creating and scaling businesses harnessing innovation and intellectual property from globally renowned British bioscience and environmental science institutes, helping to unlock the commercial potential of cutting-edge UK research to tackle climate change and biodiversity loss

Arrow Risk Management, a specialist managing general agency (MGA) underwriting platform that provides brokers and carriers with real-time data across the insurance lifecycle, has raised £2 million in funding, led by ACF Investors and a range of EIS investors. This investment will be used to fuel expansion plans and further develop its underwriting platform.

Oxford University Innovation Chief Executive Dr Matt Perkins will stand down after seven successful years in post but will remain as a non-Executive Director. Dr Mairi Gibbs, currently Chief Operating Officer at OUI, has been appointed as Interim CEO. 

Investment into tech firms in Northern Ireland has reached its highest level ever in 2023 at £143.2 million, according to the latest data from Catalyst.

Research for Catalyst’s annual NI Deal Tracker report has revealed that £143m was invested across 72 deals, with an average investment of £1.99m.

This compared to a total of £139m in 2022 across 89 deals, with an average investment of £1.6m.

Catalyst has tracked innovation investment in Northern Ireland for its Deal Tracker Report since 2017 and reviews each investment to ensure the accuracy of reporting in the Northern Ireland market.

New data released by  the National Centre for Universities and Business (NCUB), demonstrates a worrying trend. Private research and development (R&D) investment fell by 0.4% in real terms to £49.9 billion in 2022 compared to 2021. This drop comes at a time when the Government is trying to ramp up R&D investment as its central plan for economic growth.

Solivus, a pioneering developer of lightweight solar solutions has been awarded a 3-year contract for the engineering, procurement, construction, and installation of PV Solar Systems for bp and its customers following a rigorous and competitive commercial bid process. The purpose of the contract is for Solivus’ innovative rooftop solar technology to be included in bp's integrated energy solution portfolio.

Following on from the success of last year’s partnership, Catalyst and Techstart Ventures are teaming up again to offer five inspiring entrepreneurial teams who participate in Catalyst’s Co-Founders programme the chance to win a £10,000 proof of concept grant each.

PORTUGAL: Vawlt Technologies, the visionary start-up in the global long-term data storage market, has raised additional €2.15 million round of funding. 

Vawlt secured a total of three new investors, with Lince Capital as the round leader, and Basinghall and Beta Capital listing as the other two new joiners. This latest funding round also includes participation from Vawlt’s existing investors Armilar Venture Partners and Shilling VC, as well as further investment from two former Cisco and OVHcloud executives.

Funding London, the successful early-stage institutional investor bridging the funding gap for London-based SMEs, jhas reached the end of the investment period for its fund of funds, Greater London Investment Fund (GLIF).

Newcastle University spinout Jetbio is introducing 3D bioprinting products in the global multi-billion-dollar 3D bioprinting market for drug discovery, tissue engineering and regenerative medicine.

Oxford University Innovation proposes a new target to increase the proportion of women founders or co-founders from 15 per cent in 2015-16 to 50 per cent by 2030.

The University of Oxford’s Increasing Diversity in Enterprising Activities (IDEA) initiative aims to promote inclusivity in entrepreneurial activities, first tackling the under-representation of women in entrepreneurship. Over the past eight years, the proportion of women founders and co-founders of spinout companies at the University of Oxford has roughly doubled to over 28 per cent.

Catalyst, the independent, non-profit science and technology hub focused on creating opportunity for all through world leading innovation and entrepreneurship in Northern Ireland, has been recognised as one of the leading start-up hubs in Europe in a special report produced by the Financial Times, tech news platform Sifted and data provider Statista.