Silicon Microgravity (SMG), the disruptive technology company developing innovative Inertial and Gravity sensors, closes the first stage of its £2.8 million funding round with £1.8 million new funding from the UK Innovation & Science Seed Fund (UKI2S), the Oxford Innovation EIS Growth Fund, Oxford Innovation Finance’s Angel Network (OION) and the Defence and Security Accelerator (DASA). See press release here...
SMG is delighted to have been successful in the first phase of the £7.4m Department for Business and Trade competition "Railway construction innovation". This will support teams in developing innovations for later demonstration at the Global Centre of Rail Excellence in South Wales, and will be delivered in partnership with Innovate UK. The Global Centre of Rail Excellence will be the UK’s first net zero railway, and will deliver a purpose built site for world class research, testing and certification of rolling stock, infrastructure and innovative new rail technologies. More here...
Europe's largest ever infrastructure project, High Speed 2, has selected Silicon Microgravity to be one of five companies for its Cohort 5, demonstrating the potential of microgravity surveying for ground investigation and site surveying in the construction and infrastructure markets. The Accelerator provides SMG with key support and facilitates our entry into the rail industry while potentially providing HS2 with construction cost savings. here...
SMG are presenting and exhibiting at IEEE Inertial 2023. Lokesh Gurung will be presenting "A High-Performance Resonant MEMS Accelerometer with a Residual Bias Error of 30 µg and Scale Factor Repeatability of 2 ppm". If you are attending come along and meet Colin Baker, Lokesh Gurung and Theo Miani at our stand
The SMG management team of Francis Neill (CEO), Ashwin Seshia(CSO) and Colin Baker (CTO) has completed a Management Buy-Out of Silicon Microgravity with management and employees now owning 98.5% of the company.
Using our patented resonant MEMS technology we will focus on developing industry leading accelerometers and gyroscopes for the inertial navigation markets and gravity sensors for a range of applications. With one development contract already in place for our MEMS accelerometer we expect to add further development contracts for our gyroscopes and gravity sensors in the coming months.
We're really pleased to be able to promote Colin from within and recognise his talent. Well done Colin!
A vibrating beam MEMS accelerometer for gravity and seismic measurements
Our paper is entitled Brazil Pre-salt, Santos Basin: feasibility study for the application of borehole gravity to improve reservoir characterisation
Our paper is entitled MEMS surface gravimetry for geotechnical surveying.
Silicon Microgravity Ltd (SMG) are pleased to announce a collaboration with The Oil & Gas Technology Centre (OGTC) on the UK based deployments of its new generation borehole gravimeter technology. Through funding, the collaboration seeks to fast-track emerging technology capable of accelerating carbon transition towards net zero. ‘Understanding the position of reservoir fluids (whether CO2 and water or oil, gas, and water) enables Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) strategies or hydrocarbon production or to be optimised, which is why the OGTC are collaborating with SMG, supporting their upcoming field trials. Their breakthrough reservoir surveillance technology has the potential to be an economic enabler for CCS providing an alternative to regular seismic monitoring to understand CO2 plume development during CO2 injection.
Iain Martin – Subsurface Solution Centre Project Manager
Silicon Microgravity Ltd selected to join 15 leading edge companies focused on solving the world’s greatest challenges at the 2020 Unreasonable Impact programme
Barclays and Unreasonable Group continue commitment to scaling up entrepreneurial solutions helping employ thousands globally while solving some of the world’s most pressing environmental and societal challenges
Silicon Microgravity Ltd has been selected to join 15 other ground breaking growth stage ventures at the 2020 Unreasonable Impact UK & Europe programme.
A unique multi-year partnership between Barclays and Unreasonable Group, Unreasonable Impact is supporting and scaling up high-growth ventures within the green economy ensuring that their impactful solutions reach new markets, transform even more lives and create thousands more jobs in the process.
After a rigorous selection process involving hundreds of world-class companies, Jez (Jeremy) Lofts has been invited to join 15 other leading entrepreneurs from across the UK & Europe at the 12 day Unreasonable Impact programme to accelerate the growth of their companies.
Impacting the future of food, energy, sustainable living and supply chains, each entrepreneur is selected to participate based on their potential to address key social and environmental issues and to create at least 500 jobs within the next five years.
The 12-day immersive programme connects the entrepreneurs to a global community of power-house mentors and industry specialists, including experts from across Barclays.
“We are a technology platform company & our purpose is to solve complex challenges and create value through the application of gravity while meeting social and environmental needs. With our MEMS accelerometer technology we have developed the world’s first 3-axis borehole gravimeter technology for a variety of application including carbon storage (CCS) monitoring. We chose to attend the program to be able to prepare ourselves better for scale and the future. As well as working alongside some of the top high growth potential CEO’s, the access that the Barclays Unreasonable group program gives us access to some of the best in the business, as well as investors. Jez Lofts, CEO comments ‘I am most excited about meeting the best in game and with the energy of the program leveraging that to develop a world class company.”
Alisadair Gayne, Head of UK Investment Banking at Barclays, said, “We are excited to welcome the latest cohort of ventures on to the Unreasonable Impact program and to get to know more about their inspirational businesses as we partner with UNreasonable Group to support them on their journey to scale.”
Daniel Epstein, Founder and CEO of Unreasonable Group, added, “We are committed to the idea that doing well and doing good are not mutually exclusive and Unreasonable Impact’s success to date demonstrates the growing appetite for purpose and profit driven businesses. Our highly curated experiential programmes provide a space to share wisdom, build a lasting community of support and deep dive into critical conversations, empowering our entrepreneurs towards transformative impact and growth. We are so excited to welcome Silicon Microgravity Ltd into our global community and look forward to supporting Jez (Jeremy) Lofts along with our partners Barclays, to scale and in the process accelerate the creation of thousands of new jobs.”
Cumulatively, the sixteen ventures have generated more than USD $70 million in revenue and raised USD $390 million in funding.
To date, the ventures that comprise the Unreasonable Impact community have positively impacted more than 187 million people, reduced greenhouse gas emissions by 28.8 million tons, and generated more than 20,000 net new jobs. The companies have also raised more than USD $2 billion in funding. Silicon Microgravity Ltd joins this notable global network in its shared effort to create thousands of jobs on the frontier of the green economy.
For more information, visitwww.unreasonableimpact.com.
The participating companies include:
All Plants: Creating and delivering delicious 100% hand-prepared, vegan and sustainable meals to doorsteps across the UK, so people and the planet thrive together.
Biohm: mimics biological processes to synthesize man-made products, combining ideologies of the circular economy and human-centered design with future-tech to revolutionize building technologies, materials and manufacturing methods.
Connected Energy: technology company aiming to improve the lives of the under-electrified poor by enabling local businesses to provide their customers with access to affordable clean energy.
Deep Branch Biotechnology: transforms carbon dioxide directly from industrial emission into a nutritious and sustainable single cell protein thereby reducing the carbon footprint of emitters and and providing sustainable alternatives to soy and fishmeal for the feed industry.
Eco Wave Power: onshore wave energy technology company that developed a patented, smart and cost-efficient technology for turning ocean and sea waves into green electricity.
ECOncrete: offers a suite of high performance environmentally sensitive concrete solutions to reduce the ecological footprint of ports, marinas, and working waterfronts enhancing biodiversity, productivity and structural performance.
Ecoppia: pioneering automation and robotics for large-scale solar panel cleaning, Ecoppia offers a cloud-based, connected platform and a suite of robotic solutions for smart management of solar plants.
EnergyNest: thermal battery company improving energy efficiency by unlocking potentials of unused high-value heat for industrial energy producers.
Inspira Farms: provide small and growing agribusiness in the developing world with the tools, technology and expertise to significantly reduce food losses and energy costs, and access higher-value markets.
Kitro: helping restaurants reduce their food costs and wastage by using hardware devices and deep learning software to better understand where operational inefficiencies lie.
Novihum Technologies: offers natural soil-improving products that help farmers and gardeners worldwide to improve quality, yield, or to recultivate their land.
Silicon Microgravity: Technology-based company focused on developing and applying innovative technology where gravity can be applied to create value.
SunFire: develops and manufactures systems for renewable industrial gas and fuel production, replacing fossil fuels in existing infrastructure.
Tipa: create viable, fully compostable flexible packaging solutions to help nurture the soil for a plastic-free world.
Urban Volt: Facilitating the process for the world’s largest energy users to reduce their carbon footprint by removing the need for capital investment.
Worn Again Technologies: Circular recycling technology for textiles replacing virgin resources with recaptured raw materials.
About Unreasonable Impact, created with Barclays
Unreasonable Impact is an innovative multi-year multi-geographic partnership between Barclays and Unreasonable Group to launch the world’s first global network focused on scaling up entrepreneurial solutions that will help employ thousands worldwide in the emerging green economy. To date, the more than 100 ventures that comprise the global cohort operate in more than 180 countries, have raised over $2.1bn USD in funding, have generated over $2bn USD in revenue, and have created more than 20,000 net new jobs since joining Unreasonable Impact. For more information, please visit www.unreasonableimpact.com.
About Barclays
Barclays is a British universal bank. The company is diversified by business, by different types of customers and clients, and by geography. Barclays’ businesses include consumer banking and payments operations around the world, as well as a top-tier, full service, global corporate and investment bank, all of which are supported by their service company which provides technology, operations and functional services across the Group.
For further information about Barclays, please visitwww.home.barclays.
About Unreasonable Group
Bringing together a global network of entrepreneurs, investors, creatives and business leaders, Unreasonable acts as a catalytic platform for entrepreneurs tackling some of the world’s most pressing challenges facing us today. From designing highly curated immersive programmes, facilitating access to a global network of mentors to operating a private equity fund and providing advanced storytelling and media activities, Unreasonable operates at the highest intersection of business and impact. It is uniquely positioned to support growth stage entrepreneurs solving key global environment and social challenges to scale up through the deployment of knowledge, networks and capital.
For more information about Unreasonable, please visit www.unreasonablegroup.com.
Media Contact
Silicon Microgravity Limited
Beacon House
Stokenchurch Business Park
Ibstone Road
Stokenchurch
HP14 3FE, UK
CSIC will collaborate, through application expertise and funding, with SMG who are developing a next generation portable field gravimeter. The collaboration will allow field trials for smart infrastructure applications that CSIC have identified as key problems to solve.
Surface gravity measurements have relevance to the detection and mapping of buried pipelines, tunnels or conduits. The majority of this buried infrastructure exists underneath roads and other built infrastructure. Trenching to address maintenance, replacement, repair or extension of these systems often results in significant disruption to traffic and potential damage to other utilities and/or to the environment and accurate mapping of buried structures prior to trenching or new construction is therefore of interest. Large underground construction projects (for e.g. Crossrail) also require careful and comprehensive surveying of buried underground infrastructure to minimise disturbance and damage during construction or regular operation. Excavation tools deployed during tunnelling could complete tunnelling more effectively by identifying the geology of the formation well ahead of the excavation site. Surface gravity anomalies due to the presence of sub-surface voids can provide information about the presence of tunnels, abandoned mines, sinkholes and groundwater hydrology.
Existing gravimeters are fragile and akward to transport, heavy, expensive and require skilled operators to acquire and analyse field data for geotechnical applications. With a view to addressing these limitations, Silicon Microgravity Ltd. is developing a surface gravimeter based on a MEMS device with relevance to geotechnical surveying applications which should considerably reduce the costs involved as well as ultimately provide a much more robust, practical solution for regular field use.
CSIC is an Innovation and Knowledge Centre (IKC) funded by EPSRC and Innovate UK with a mission is to transform the future of infrastructure and construction through smarter information.
We completed our first prototype field trial of our 3 axis borehole gravity technology in a CO2 storage reservoir scenario in Canada. Partnering with CCP (CO2 Capture Project) and Petroleum Technology Research Centre and Eclipse E-Line Services Inc. this marks an important first step in characterising of this emerging technology for storage CO2 plume surveillance.
We are pleased to announce the doubling in size of our Silicon Microgravity Ltd Technology Center in Cambridge this month to accommodate our growth and technology roadmap trajectory! This includes adding new purposed calibration labs, MEMS labs and tooling area as well accommodating the growing team.
Our MEMs surface gravimeter test is completed in collaboration with the QuantumSensors hub in Birmingham and the Pioneer Gravity project. This project is focuses on quantifying features through density variation in the subsurface.
Designed to monitor CO2 plume growth or water front movement in reservoirs, this marks a new era in borehole measurements. ‘We have a lot to learn and data wont be public for a while but I can say we have made significant progress forward in our goal to offer a CO2 plume and reservoir surveillance answer. We shall be continuing with field testing programmmes full pace', comments Jez Lofts CEO.
"I am really proud to be joining Silicon Microgravity Ltd as my next chapter! Having watched with fascination SMG’s rapid growth and coupled with the future runway for the technology in many different everyday applications, I will be working to build the business utilising my subsurface knowledge and operational experience as we grow the CO2 storage and reservoir application spaces and move beyond. With a great company purpose, an amazing and intellectually prestigious team and leadership, I’m honoured to be working amongst the best."
We’re out for some quiet-time! In July SMG take our ‘mini’ surface prototype ‘the cube’ for some quiet testing with an absolute gravimeter at the BGS SGF Space Geodesy Facility, Herstmonceux, East Sussex.
Silicon Microgravity were showcased by BP as one of 4 BP Ventures backed companies at their suite at the Houston OTC (Offshore Technology Conference) conference in May. SMG CEO, Jez Lofts had the chance to show case their MEMS accelerometer and gyro developments with customers from all over the world.
SMG presented at the SPE Middle East Oil show, Bahrain. The paper entitled, Three-Axis Borehole Gravity Logging for Reservoir Surveillance. Can be found here. The full title is Lofts, Jeremy; Zett, Adrian; Clifford, Peter; Li, Yaoguo; Krahenbuhl, Richard; Seshia Ashwin, Three-Axis Borehole Gravity Logging for Reservoir Surveillance. (2019) SPE-194845-MS, MEOS Bahrain
SMG enters in to an agreement to acquire gravity data for the CO2 Capture Project (CCP) Phase 4. The CCP is an award-winning group of major energy companies working to advance the technologies that will underpin the deployment of industrial-scale CO2 capture and storage. www.co2captureproject.org
We are very pleased to have successfully completed SMG’s first integrated borehole field test in November. A big thank you to the team who have worked so hard, and moved a mountain, as well as to our supplier partner Edge Energy Ltd.
UK consortium of leading scientific and engineering companies has come together to develop a new industry of quantum cold-atom sensors that will detect and monitor objects beneath the ground better than any current technology. SMG will develop and provide surface based sensors for benchmarking. Read the press release here
SMG celebrate the official opening by the board of our Silicon Microgravity Cambridge Technology Center at the Cambridge Innovation Park, Waterbeach, Cambridge this week! This is home to our growing R&D and Engineering team and features a modern digital electronics lab plus separate analogue electronics lab with purpose built low vibration table. We have recruited some of the top Cambridge University talent and if you are up for the challenge we are seeking a number of exciting and key roles as we fufil our purpose of applying gravity to create value. Check out our careers.
We are proud to open our Technology Center at the Cambridge Innovation Centre, Waterbeach, Cambridge. This will house our growing team and will feature modern electronics lab as well as office facilities.
Silicon Microgravity (SMG), a spin-out from both BP and the University of Cambridge, has raised $7 million from IP Group, Parkwalk, BP Ventures and Cambridge Enterprise.
Silicon Microgravity Limited is a privately held company focused on developing and applying innovative technology primarily to improve surveillance, appraisal and production of oil and gas with additional application to CO2 storage, water management, mining and defence. Our technology has the potential to disrupt current practices and advance reservoir surveillance so that our clients can achieve real efficiencies and cost savings while meeting their desired social, safety and environmental goals.
SMG is based on over ten years of research from the Nanoscience Centre at the University of Cambridge in collaboration with the energy company BP PLC. It has developed a unique high performance, ultra-sensitive, yet robust microelectromechanical system (MEMS). The MEMS technology consists of a 3-axis accelerometer with a projected resolution of approximately one billionth of the Earth’s gravity. SMG is also funded for and actively researching a related MEMS gyro technology with a potential application to inertial navigation.
This funding round of $7m will allow the company to commercialise its technology and grow rapidly. (Download full press release)
Jez is an experienced energy industry executive with over 25 years’ in energy / mining fields with leadership experience covering business management, new technology introduction, strategic marketing and global sales-account management, as well as reservoir technical expertise. He joins from Baker Hughes.
In addition to our Cambridge base, SMG move to our Executive and Sales office, Stokenchurch, High Wycombe.
Arif Mustafazade joined in March as Senior Module Design engineer, Douglas Young as Software Engineer in April.
SMG welcomes a new key player to the company Dr Philipp Steinmann as Senior Engineer.
Paul Vickery, Executive Chairman, will be presenting Silicon Microgravity at the conference “IIoT and Digital Solutions for Oil and Gas” on 8 June in Amsterdam where he will explain how SMG is providing enhanced oil recovery with borehole gravity.
Paul Vickery, Executive Chairman, on 10 May presented SMG to the MEMS and Sensors Technical Conference at Stanford University where he explained the wide-ranging potential uses of gravity data in applications as diverse as tunnel detection, monitoring of groundwater, early warning of landslides, carbon storage monitoring and navigation.
Paul Vickery, Executive Chairman, on 1 May presented to the start-up roundup at the OTC in Houston announcing the intention to raise $5m in a series A fund raising
"Silicon MicroGravity (SMG) was spun out of University of Cambridge in September 2014 to commercialize a novel sensor technology used by oil companies to enhance oil recovery. The company has received initial funding of $3 million from Imperial Innovations Group and Cambridge Enterprise, together with grant funding from the UK government. The company has raised £1.5m to date and plans to seek up to £5m in additional capital in Q2’17.
Gravity sensing is a well-established surface exploration technology; however, it is not easily available in the borehole. SMG’s sensors, developed in partnership with BP, are sensitive enough to measure one billionth the level of Earth’s gravity and are small and robust enough to be sent deep into boreholes to distinguish oil from water. SMG estimates that the technology could improve yields on conventional reservoirs by up to 2%, representing significant increases in production and revenues.
The sensors are based on MEMS technology. The Company’s MEMS technology uses a highly sensitive resonant frequency sensing methodology, which provides improved performance at low frequencies relative to other MEMS seismic sensors based on capacitive or optical sensing. The sensing methodology provides breakthrough sensitivities compared to commercial MEMS accelerometers, enabling high-resolution gravity measurements. MicroG LaCoste has a borehole gravity system; however, SMG argues that its MEMS-based solution offers numerous advantages. A team of Cambridge scientists, led by Dr. Ashwin Seshia, of the University’s Department of Engineering, has been working with BP to develop the sensors. Design work began in 2010 and has resulted in several generations of prototypes. A successful test was conducted in 2012 prompting BP to fund a follow-on project to address further optimization and pursue large-scale manufacture of the sensors. The first field trial in a production well is scheduled for 2017..."
Silicon Microgravity Ltd, the spin out from Cambridge University manufacturing gravity sensors have formed an advisory board with BP Ventures, the corporate venture division of BP plc., to explore future cooperation around borehole microgravity logging technology for use in oil and gas exploration. The advisory board comprises Luis Alcoser and Robin Wye from BP and Paul Vickery and Francis Neill from SMG.
Luis Alcoser from BP Ventures, said: “BP has a strong track record of developing differentiated technologies and we see the SMG borehole gravity technology as a key enabling technology with potential applications across the BP global portfolio. That’s why BP Ventures is pleased to further strengthen the collaborative relationship with SMG through this relationship.”
“The BP support is intended to enable SMG to develop a greater understanding of operator requirements and also the ability to deploy the technology in a range of applications.”
Paul Vickery, CEO from SMG said:
“We are delighted to be working with BP Ventures to deliver a structured qualification process for SMG’s patented gravity sensors.
“We believe our new proprietary, patented borehole microgravity logging technology, based on a unique approach, will present a disruptive approach to the measurement of water flood fronts in major conventional reservoirs.”
“Our phase density technology has the potential to enable operators to secure significant increases in strategic value through 1) improved sweep efficiency & recovery through better Enhanced Oil Recovery management (flood front prediction, coning and sanding risk), 2) better thin bed detection in resource assessment, and 3) enable superior bypassed pay identification.”
BP Ventures is a core component of BP’s innovation ecosystem, focusing on the capture of strategic value from the co-development and deployment of new, cutting-edge technologies. BP is identifying and investing in private, high growth, game-changing technology companies, accelerating cutting edge innovations across the energy spectrum. The investment portfolio is primarily focused on emerging technologies in oil and gas exploration and production and downstream conversion processes. BP Ventures also partners with entrepreneurial companies specialising in biotech, water, advanced materials, and digital technology.
Silicon MicroGravity (SMG), a newly-formed University of Cambridge spin-out that has developed a novel sensor technology used by oil companies to enhance oil recovery, has received initial funding of $3 million from Imperial Innovations Group plc (AIM: IVO, ‘Innovations’) and Cambridge Enterprise, the commercialisation arm of the University of Cambridge, together with grant funding from the UK government. SMG’s sensors, developed in collaboration with BP, are sensitive enough to measure one billionth the level of Earth’s gravity and are small and robust enough to be sent deep into boreholes to distinguish oil from water. Once the position of water is established and tracked, reservoir engineers can mitigate the potentially damaging results of water reaching a production well. SMG estimates that the technology could markedly improve yields on conventional reservoirs, representing significant increases in production and revenues.
University of Cambridge spin-out secures $3 million investment to improve the efficiency of oil recovery
CAMBRIDGE, UK 29 February, 2016 -- Silicon MicroGravity (SMG), a newly-formed University of Cambridge spin-out that has developed a novel sensor technology used by oil companies to enhance oil recovery, has received initial funding of $3 million from Imperial Innovations Group plc (AIM: IVO, ‘Innovations’) and Cambridge Enterprise, the commercialisation arm of the University of Cambridge, together with grant funding from the UK government.
SMG’s sensors, developed in partnership with BP, are sensitive enough to measure one billionth the level of Earth’s gravity and are small and robust enough to be sent deep into boreholes to distinguish oil from water.
Once the position of water is established and tracked, reservoir engineers can mitigate the potentially damaging results of water reaching a production well. SMG estimates that the technology could improve yields on conventional reservoirs by up to 2 percent, representing significant increases in production and revenues.
A team of Cambridge scientists, led by Dr Ashwin Seshia, of the University’s Department of Engineering, has been working closely with BP to develop the sensors. Design work began in 2010 and has resulted in several generations of prototypes providing experimental validation of the underlying device approach. A successful test of the technology was conducted in 2012 prompting BP to fund a follow-on project to address further optimisation and pursue large-scale manufacture of the sensors.
SMG was formed in 2014 to accelerate the development of the product and develop a service that can capture and analyse data on behalf of oil companies. The first field trial in a production well is scheduled for 2017.
Innovations led the funding round alongside Cambridge Enterprise, which also invested and licensed the technology to SMG. SMG is also being supported through the Institution of Mechanical Engineers’ Stephenson Fund, a private investor, InnovateUK and NERC, which have awarded a substantial grant.
SMG’s advisory board includes Kevin Dodds, General Manager of ANLEC in Australia, and Professor Roger Howe from Stanford University.
Dr Ashwin Seshia, co-founder of Silicon Microgravity, said: “The SMG devices advance the frontiers of gravity sensor technology building upon several years of University research and innovation. SMG brings together a leading international team of experts to address the next phase of technology translation and we are looking forward to working collaboratively with our partners to deploy these tools widely.”
Paul Vickery, Chairman and co-founder of Silicon Microgravity, said: “I am very excited to form this new company based on a long standing collaboration between Cambridge University and BP. We have created a compelling business plan, raised a sizable initial investment and formed a credible global team to launch the company. I look forward to building a business that can help oil companies enhance oil recovery from their major assets.”
Robert Bahns from Imperial Innovations said: “SMG has an outstanding technology developed at Cambridge University that has been significantly de-risked through a longstanding partnership with BP. The company has all the key ingredients in place to demonstrate the commercial value of the technology, and we are very pleased to be able to lead this funding round to take them through this stage and beyond.”
Julian Peck from Cambridge Enterprise said: “We are delighted that Dr Seshia’s unique technology is being commercialised by SMG. We are very excited by the market opportunity and we are keen to support future progress.”
Akira Kirton from BP Ventures said: “Water management is an increasingly important issue for BP and the whole industry, so we are excited about the potential for SMG’s technology to help us pinpoint where water is within a reservoir and enable us to take mitigating action. This collaboration fits perfectly with BP Ventures’ strategy of investing in new technologies that can be rapidly field tested and deployed.”
Stephen Tetlow MBE, Chief Executive of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, said: “We are excited to be supporting such an exciting and cutting-edge technology. The Institution’s Stephenson Fund aims to fulfil the Institution’s original purpose to give an impulse to invention and also help companies overcome the investment hurdle between Research and Development and bringing a product to market. This innovation could revolutionise oil well recovery and is an example of exactly the sort of innovation we are committed to supporting.”
About Cambridge Enterprise - www.enterprise.cam.ac.uk
Cambridge Enterprise Limited is a wholly owned subsidiary of the University of Cambridge, responsible for the commercialisation of University intellectual property. Activities include management and licensing of intellectual property and patents, proof of concept funding and support for University staff and research groups wishing to provide expert advice or facilities to public and private sector organisations. Cambridge Enterprise provides access to angel and early stage capital through the Cambridge Enterprise Seed Funds, University of Cambridge Enterprise Funds, Cambridge Innovation Capital and Cambridge Enterprise Venture Partners, and offers business planning, mentoring, and other related programmes.
About Imperial Innovations - www.imperialinnovations.co.uk
Imperial Innovations Group plc (“Innovations”) creates, builds and invests in pioneering technology companies and licensing opportunities developed from outstanding scientific research from the 'Golden Triangle', the geographical region broadly bounded by London, Cambridge and Oxford. This area has an unrivalled cluster of outstanding academic research and technology businesses, and is home to four of the world’s top 10 universities, as well as leading research institutions, the cream of the UK’s science and technology businesses and many of its leading investors.
Innovations supports scientists and entrepreneurs in the commercialisation of their ideas, through the licensing of intellectual property, by leading the formation of new companies, by recruiting high-calibre management teams and by providing investment and encouraging co-investment. Innovations remains an active investor over the life of its portfolio companies, with the majority of Innovations’ investment going into businesses in which it is already a shareholder.
Since becoming a public company in 2006, Innovations has raised more than £434.0 million of equity from investors, which has enabled it to invest in some of the most exciting spin-outs to come out of UK academic research. In addition, the Group has agreed £80.0 million in loan facilities from the European Investment Bank (EIB).
Between Innovations’ admission to AIM (August 2006) and 31 July 2015, Innovations has invested a total of £236.8 million across its portfolio companies, which have raised collectively investment of £1.3 billion.
About BP Ventures
BP Ventures identifies and invests in private, high growth, game-changing technology companies, accelerating cutting edge innovations across the entire energy spectrum. The Investment portfolio is primarily focused on emerging technologies in oil and gas exploration and production and downstream conversion processes. BP Ventures also partners with entrepreneurial companies specialising in biotech, water, advanced materials, and digital technology.
About the Institution of Mechanical Engineers
The Institution of Mechanical Engineers was established in 1847 and has some of the world’s greatest engineers in its history books. It is one of the fastest growing professional engineering institutions. Headquartered in London, we have operations around the world and over 113,000 members in more than 140 countries working at the heart of the most important and dynamic industries such as the automotive, rail, aerospace, medical, power and construction industries. The Institution of Mechanical Engineers’ Stephenson LP fund aims to help companies overcome the investment hurdle between Research and Development and bringing a product to market. The fund, initially worth a total of £2 million, is in line with the Institution of Mechanical Engineers’ original statement of purpose set out by founder George Stephenson in 1847 to “give an impulse to invention likely to be useful to the world.” The Stephenson LP Fund is independently managed by specialist venture capital company Midven Ltd. and aims to invest in innovative companies engaged in mechanical engineering over the next few years.
SMG website is launched today. More news and a press release to follow shortly...