Angel Academe invests in Abundance Generation
We’re delighted to announce that a syndicate of Angel Academe members have made an investment inAbundance Generationhelping to complete an £850k round. Co-Founder Louise Wilson pitched to the angel group in June and really impressed us with the quality of her team, progress made to date and the vision for the future of the business.
Now into its third year, Abundance is a platform that allows individuals to make long-term loans to an ever-increasing portfolio of sustainability projects. To quote Louise, “We started with a simple idea – to link communities and individuals with Renewable Energy Projects and make it possible for everyone to share in the benefits of clean energy production.”
To date, over £6.6 million has been lent by more than 1,400 individual lenders torenewables projects includingREG High Down(wind farm) in Cornwall andBNRG Gorse(solar array) in Kent. Despite its relatively short history, Abundance has already won a covetedGuardian Sustainable Business Awardplusawards fromSustainable City(Finance),Solar Power Portal(Most Innovative Marketing Campaign),BusinessGreen Leaders(Small Business of the Year),Ashden Awards(Gold), andNew Energy and Cleantech(Deal of the Year). It’s also been put on theFinTech 50 2014 Watchlistof the most disruptive European businesses to watch out for in 2014.
This round of investment will serve as the springboard for Abundance to accelerate its growth and build on its recent highly successful marketing campaign.
Louise Wilson of Abundance Generation says of the deal: “It was a pleasure to work with Angel Academe who were responsive and constructive throughout. We are delighted to welcome our new shareholders and look forward to working with them and capitalising on some of their experience in other ways.”
Sarah Turner, founder of Angel Academe, talks about the relevance of this, the latest deal for the women-focused investment group: “The shortfall in funding for small to medium clean energy projects is all too present and crowdlending is an obvious solution with the long-term attractive returns they can deliver. Abundance creates value for lenders and borrowers that traditional finance can’t and Louise, Bruce and Karl are visionaries in this exciting space. We’re delighted to be part of it.”
About Angel Academe:
Angel Academe isapro-women(but not women-only) angel investment group focussed ontechnology. Most, but not all, of our angels are women and we like to support ambitious women-founded and led businesses.
We believe that to help more women “go big” with their ventures, we need to increase the number of women investors. We also want to become (even) better investors by sharing our experience and investing together in a fun and collaborative environment.
