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Fibre optic and cabling technology specialist Lumenisity Limited has closed a GBP7.5 million funding round from a consortium of investors, including a GBP5 million investment from BGF, and GBP2.5 million from Parkwalk, an investor in UK university spinouts.The company’s existing industrial strategic investors have also supplied significant additional funding.
Lumenisity develops and manufactures advanced cable solutions to address the need for high speed transactions and bandwidth increases in high capacity communications systems.
Hollowcore fibres, where light propagates in an air containing core formed by microscopic capillaries, are long recognised as the next stage of advancement in fibre optic cable technology.
Presteigne Broadcast Hire (PBH), supplier to the TV studio and worldwide live broadcast market, has secured a GBP3 million working capital and refinance package from ThinCats, an alternative lender to mid-sized SMEs.PBH was founded in 1991 and bought by management with backing from funds managed by NVM Private Equity in 2016. It operates from bases near Gatwick Airport and in Warrington, providing a range of technical production solutions from dry hire supply to the full turn-key provision of portable production units with engineers for many prestigious events including the Boat Race, European Football Championships, FIFA World Cup and Rugby World
Ara Partners, a private equity firm specialising in industrial decarbonisation investments, has hired Manoj Sahoo as Operating Partner.Sahoo brings more than 20 years of experience across commercial, operational, and technical functions in the food & agriculture sector.
“We’re very happy to add Manoj to the Ara Partners team,” says Cory Steffek, Managing Director of Ara Partners.” Manoj has a long and distinguished history as a prominent executive in food & agriculture. His experience leading growing, technology-focused organisations makes him an excellent fit for Ara Partners’ investment model, and we look forward to benefiting from his expertise and deep industry
Border to Coast Pensions Partnership (“Border to Coast”), has secured GBP1 billion of commitments to Private Equity investments as it continues to develop new investment opportunities for its eleven local government pension schemes, which collectively have assets of cGBP46 billion.
Border to Coast has completed GBP500 million of private equity investments from its first offering (Series 1A) in line with expected timescales. The portfolio consists of nine investments with high quality managers providing exposure to Border to Coast’s targeted themes within Private Equity.
Border to Coast has also secured a further GBP485 million of commitments from eight Partner Funds to
One Equity Partners (OEP), a middle market private equity firm, is to sell Simplura Health Group (Simplura), a provider of high-quality home care services for the elderly and disabled, to Providence Service Corporation (: PRSC).
Through its subsidiary, Logisticare, Providence Service Corporation is the nation’s largest manager of non-emergency medical transportation programmess.
The sale of Simplura will result in the successful realisation of OEP’s 2016 investment in the market-leading provider of non-medical home care services. Headquartered in Valley Stream, New York, the Company employs over 15,000 professionals, including 14,300 direct caregivers from a network of 57 locations in seven states
Alternative asset investment management company, Pollen Street Capital (Pollen Street), has appointed David Jones as Operating Partner for Technology. The newly created role marks a wider strategic focus at Pollen Street on accelerating the progress of the financial and business services industry across Europe through digital innovation, at a pivotal time for the sector.
In his role, Jones will be developing Pollen Street’s digital transformation capability, working collaboratively with its private equity and credit portfolio to realise the business benefits of technology transformation. This will be realised through a strategic and tactical analysis of portfolio companies’ use of digital technology
The debt advisory team at Zeus Capital has advised on GBP1 billion of debt facilities, completing 21 transactions in the two years since its inception.Since starting in September 2018, the three-strong Zeus Capital Debt Advisory team has provided debt advisory services across a broad range of transaction types, including acquisition financings, re-financings, covenant amendments, balance sheet restructurings and lender education processes.
The team has been particularly active during the lockdown period caused by Covid-19, completing five transactions since March, primarily assisting companies to raise liquidity lines as well as assisting in restructuring their banking facilities.
In total, more
Vienna-based investment and trading platform Bitpanda has raised a USD52 million Series A funding round, Europe’s largest series A funding round of 2020, led by Peter Thiel’s Valar Ventures.
Cogniac, a specialist in enterprise-class AI image and video analysis, has raised USD10 million in Series B financing round led by Autotech Ventures.The funding will be used to hire key staff, expand sales and marketing, and support the growth of the company.
Cogniac utilises the latest AI technology to build inspection workflows, offering enterprise-class AI-based deep learning solutions that automates visual inspection tasks like classifying, detecting, counting and measuring to human level accuracy and beyond. With a camera agnostic, agile approach to AI and elegant end-to-end architecture, Cogniac simplifies the deployment of AI in enterprise video and image analysis across
Exotec, a robotics solution provider for the logistics sector and creator of the Skypod 3D warehouse robots, has closed a USD90 million financing round, led by 83North – with participation from Dell Technologies Capital – and supported by historical investors, Iris Capital and Breega.This new funding will further fuel Exotec’s international development, especially their recently formed Atlanta and Tokyo teams and help them meet the growing demand for warehouse automation technology in the USA and Asia. Exotec has the ambition to become the leader in robotics solution for logistics and forecasts they will produce up to 4000 robots per year
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