Launch of British Business Bank-backed Accelerated Digital Vehicle
The British Business Bank has today announced that it is backing a new venture to provide investment to innovative UK digital technology businesses, driving growth and job creation across the country.
A third of the funding for the new £150m platform, which will provide evergreen, patient capital to smaller businesses looking to grow no matter what stage of development, will be provided under the Bank’s Enterprise Capital Funds (ECF) programme.
The Accelerated Digital Ventures (ADV) platform will make funds available to digital technology SMEs, boosting sector growth across the UK. The platform will support the existing digital technology hubs in Belfast, Bristol, Cambridge, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Glasgow, London, Manchester, Newcastle, Oxford and Sheffield.
Keith Morgan, British Business Bank CEO, said: “This new venture platform, supported by our Enterprise Capital Funds programme, will help innovative digital technology businesses to start up and scale up rapidly and successfully throughout all stages of their development. We are pleased to be a part of this exciting new initiative, and look forward to seeing businesses across the UK benefit from the much needed long-term funding it will provide.”
Lee Strafford, CEO of ADV, said: “ADV has been established to help more of our emerging startups and scaleups to scale big. There are world class innovators in every corner of the UK. We intend to seek out the best investment opportunities at scale and ensure these companies, irrelevant of size and location, have the support they need to supercharge growth.”
British Business Bank is supporting the new ADV platform, alongside Legal & General (L&G) and Woodford Investment Management, as part of its remit to design, deliver and efficiently manage UK-wide smaller business access to finance programmes for the UK government.
ECFs are commercially-focused funds which bring together private and public money to make equity investments in high growth businesses. This latest commitment – the 23rd ECF – brings the programme’s total investment capacity to over £815m.
Businesses can find out about their finance options, including equity finance, by accessing the British Business Bank’s Business Finance Guide (co-published with the ICAEW), which provides a comprehensive overview of funding choices for businesses at all stages of their development.
