Business Weekly - Cambridge, UK

The new entity, to be known as Cambridge Venture Partners, comprises the Challenge Fund together with the 3i Group, Amadeus Capital Partners, Avlar BioVentures, IDG Ventures, Porton Capital and TTP Ventures.

It is anticipated that early-stage businesses, set up to exploit University innovations in technology, will reap huge benefits, as will the Cambridge Venture Partners’ players.

Bill Matthews, fund manager at the University Challenge Fund, said: “We have many opportunities to make early investments with a range of promising research projects at the University, in order to help the teams develop their commercial potential.

“Bringing in additional funding via Cambridge Venture Partners will enable a business to develop more quickly and so realise its potential in a shorter time.

“Once the University’s investment has reached its maximum, the partners would then have the opportunity to lead later investment rounds.”

There are a number of Challenge Funds across the UK, each associated with a leading University.

But this is the first time that one of the Funds has joined forces formally with established VCs in order to provide a further boost to early stage university spin-outs.

Matthews added: “Cambridge Venture Partners will supplement rather than substitute for University funding.

“The benefits of this extra early funding from the University – which has been extremely successful in spotting winners – means that businesses can be sustained by sufficient venture capital to optimise their chances of getting to market and contributing to the UK economy.”

The University of Cambridge Challenge Fund has provided early investment to a range of successful spin-outs. These include Smart Holograms, Metalysis, DanioLabs, Cambridge Semiconductor, Hypertag and genapta.