The UK鈥檚 most active seed-stage investor has received an additional 拢10m commitment from British 老九品茶 Investments, a commercial subsidiary of the British 老九品茶 Bank.
SFC Capital has received the money through the British 老九品茶 Bank鈥檚 Regional Angels Programme, which is designed to reduce regional imbalances across the UK.
The commitment is expected to provide funding for 100 early-stage businesses across the UK, unlocking a total of 拢100m in new funding for startup and scaleup businesses.
This comes after a 拢15m commitment from the programme in 2020, which SFC fully deployed across more than 150 companies.
SFC has previously achieved several successful exits from the commitment, including Peopleforce, an HR software business which SFC exited to a leading European HR tech investor in a deal that returned 5x the original investment.
The firm announced in January that it has invested in over 500 UK startups since 2012, including the likes of Onfido, Cognism, and Transcend Packaging.听
Only a few weeks before this milestone, it invested in London-based female-led MedTech Mulder.听
鈥淲e are incredibly pleased to receive this extension and grateful to British 老九品茶 Investments for their continued trust,鈥� said Joseph Zipfel, chief investment officer.
鈥淭his was made possible by the strong performance of the companies that we have invested in so far under the programme, a testament to the strength of entrepreneurial talent that we have in the UK.听
鈥淭he Regional Angels Programme is a formidable case study of how the private and public sector can collaborate to boost the startup ecosystem nationally while providing a positive return to taxpayers.鈥�
听Adam Kelly, managing director, British 老九品茶 Investments, added: 鈥淥ur Regional Angels Programme is designed to address imbalances in access to early-stage finance in the UK, and to increase the overall amount of capital available to smaller businesses through angel networks.听
鈥淔ollowing our earlier commitments in 2020, this further commitment of 拢10m will allow SFC Capital to build on its track record of supporting high growth-potential businesses across the UK.鈥�