See further coverage here:
VC unveils £10m for early-stage northern business (BusinessCloud)
Praetura Ventures to invest £10m in Northern early-stage business (Business Live)
Investment firm unveils new £10m fund for Northern businesses (Business Desk)
Manchester, 10th September 2019:
Praetura Ventures today announces it is raising money for its second Enterprise Investment Scheme (EIS) fund, the Praetura EIS 2020 Fund. The company plans to raise up to £10m to invest in around six to eight early-stage companies predominantly in the North of England. This comes less than six months after the VC firm’s record-breaking £15m maiden EIS fundraise.
Since closing its 2019 fund in May this year, Praetura has already invested a total of £7.3m in a number of exciting early-stage businesses, including ecommerce platform Dr Fertility and conversation-as-a-service chatbot provider Futr. The VC firm has invested alongside globally recognised businesses: Shell Ventures, when it backed energy management company Steamaco in June, and Merian Chrysalis Investment Company, when it backed technology company Sorted, in July.
Praetura Ventures aims to have fully deployed the Praetura 2019 EIS Fund by November 2019. The business is now raising its second fund to satisfy investor demand and to continue to invest in exceptional businesses. The 2020 fund will back bright exciting, early-stage businesses in the North and beyond with between £500k and £2m per business, while providing support and guidance to management teams via its ‘More than money’ approach.
Alongside the launch of its 2020 fund, the business is also announcing a number of senior hires including Business Development Managers Sandra Corcoran and Stephen Green, both from Standard Life Aberdeen, who will be tasked with growing Praetura’s partnerships with financial advisers and wealth managers across the North of England. Dr Andy Round, formerly of Maven Capital Partners, also joins Praetura Ventures as a Director. An experienced investor with a speciality in life sciences, Round will be tasked with growing the firm’s investments in this space.
David Foreman, Managing Director at Praetura Ventures, said:
“We are delighted by the progress made by the business and by the quality of investments made by the 2019 fund to date. Raising our second fund so quickly after our first demonstrates the opportunity available to us in the North of England, and evidences the scale of demand we’re seeing from investors.”
Jonathan Prescott, Business Development Director at Praetura Ventures, said:
“The Praetura EIS 2020 Fund seeks to build on the momentum we’ve gathered over the past 12 months, deploying capital into some of the brightest businesses in the North and beyond. Investor appetite has been strong since the close of our previous fundraise. Sandra and Steve joining the team at this exciting period of development will give us the capacity to support growing demand from advisors across the UK.”
