2018 has been another highly active year for Archangels, we have led a record breaking £22.4m of investment in Scottish tech and life sciences businesses.
Including £10.9m of our members’ cash in 10 investment rounds across the year, with co-investment of £9.4m from investment partners including Scottish Enterprise’s investment arm, Scottish Investment Bank, which, at £6.0m, was the largest co-investor. Other co-investment partners included NVM Private Equity, Maven Capital Partners, Par Equity and US-based Julz Co.
Archangels’ 2018 investment activity included leading first-time investments in two Scottish businesses:
Bio-Images Drug Delivery Ltd (BDD Ltd): £2.0m investment announced in March, to enable the business to scale; focusing on its unique OralogiKTM precision timed drug delivery system.
Speech Graphics: In October investment of £2.0m was raised, enabling the Edinburgh and California based technology business – which provides market-leading, real-time audio based, emotional facial animation – to target the customer service sector’s Intelligent Virtual Assistant market.
In 2018 we also achieved two exits, which between them returned significant funds to our members:
In April Oregon Timber Frame Ltd, one of the UK’s largest independent timber frame manufacturers, who specialise in the design, manufacture and erection of timber frame structures for the construction industry, completed a buy-out of its non-management shareholders. This included Archangels’ 15% stake in the business, bringing to a close a 20 year investment relationship.
Then in October 2018 ZoneFox Ltd were acquired by Fortinet, provider of cyber security to the largest enterprises, service providers and government organisations around the world.
During the year, Archangels was also recognised as ‘Lead Investment Syndicate of the Year’ by the UK Business Angels Association and ‘Investor of the Year’ at the inaugural Scottish Tech Startup Awards.
Reflecting the intrinsically high-risk nature of early stage investing, there were two failures among the Archangels’ portfolio in 2018.
David Ovens, Chief Operating Officer at Archangels, said:
“Archangels led another record-breaking amount of investment in Scottish early stage companies in 2018. In spite of the uncertainties around Brexit and the global economy, the tech and life sciences ecosystem in Scotland is buoyant. There remains a steady stream of innovative and ground-breaking ideas, satisfying the strong appetite of our members for investment opportunities that underpin Scotland’s position as an entrepreneurial hotspot.”
