Wednesday January 1st 2020

drug manufacturer - VR motion platforms

- video games - van-leasing –

print and design

Northumberland :: Manchester :: Hertfordshire :: London

Arcinova £9m | Immotion Group | Bossa Studios | Vanarama £39.1m | Moo.Com £75m

News about 5 UK growth companies and/or accelerators + turnover in the GRID marketplace 17th – 23rd June 2018:

ARCINOVA: drug manufacturer - Northumberland

£5m boost from Business Growth Fund allows Arcinova to go on hiring spree | The Sunday Times, June 17 2018

DZ profile: Arc Trinova Limited (Arcinova)

Business: makes drugs that treat rare cancers - drug manufacturer that helps small pharmaceutical companies bring new medicines to market. Has more than doubled its customer base to 125 in the past two years.

Launched: 2016

Location: Alnwick, Northumberland

Founder: Ian Shott, a chemical engineer who used to work for Astra Zeneca.

Staff: 100

Financials: revenues close to £9m

Investment: has raised £5m from the BUSINESS GROWTH FUND to add 200 scientists in the next four years.

News:

1. recently announced the award of a £1.5m INNOVATE UK grant for the development of new flexible modular manufacturing technologies, a project which is set to demonstrate the operating feasibility of world first innovative continuous production tools. … three-year period …in collaboration with the UNIVERSITY OF NOTTINGHAM.

2. Following an introduction by BGF, Arcinova has appointed Mike Hudson, co-founder of NEUROPHARM, as non-executive Chair.

IMMOTION GROUP: VR motion platforms - Manchester

Virtual reality start-up Immotion plans £5m float | Peter Evans, The Sunday Times. June 17 2018

DZ profile: Immotion Group Plc

Business: produces virtual reality experiences used in shopping malls and theme parks. Its technology, which combines motion, sound and graphics, is already installed in several shopping centres in Britain and Legoland in Boston.

Launched: 2017

Location: Manchester, Los Angeles, Dubai and Tokyo

Founder: co-founded by Martin Higginson, the tech guru behind MONSTERMOB and NETPLAY TV

Investment: is set to float on AIM to raise £5m. ….will be valued at about £20m. The brokers advising on the deal are WH IRELAND and SHARD CAPITAL. …will use the cash to expand in Europe and America.

BOSSA STUDIOS: Video games - London

Video gaming, the secret industry raking in billions | Liam Kelly, The Sunday Times. June 17 2018

DZ profile: Bossa Studios Limited

Business: Video games company.  Has just launched Worlds Adrift, a multi-player online game that Lucca said is for gamers “graduating from Minecraft”. There are no rules or objectives and players can do what they want — from mapping the world as cartographers to fighting battles and conquering islands.

Launched: 2010

Location: Shoreditch, east London

Founders: Henrique Olifiers, Roberta Lucca and Imre Jele

Investment: ATOMICO, the venture capital firm set up by Skype founder Niklas Zennstrom, led a $10m investment in Bossa last year.

News: ….government tax break introduced in 2012, but wrangles with Brussels delayed its introduction for two years. Olifiers said it was instrumental in stemming the “talent and business drain” to other countries

VANARAMA: van-leasing - Hertfordshire

Bananarama and a man with more than one van | Liam Kelly The Sunday Times. June 17 2018

DZ profile: Autorama Uk Ltd (Vanarama)

Business: van-leasing company which acts as a broker between van leasers and its customers, mostly builders, joiners, plumbers and delivery drivers.

Launched: 2006

Location: Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire

Founder: Andy Alderson, 49, who used to run his own used-car dealership, launched Vanarama with £100,000 of savings and credit card debt. He shifted to leasing because of how quickly vehicles depreciate in value. He also felt that customers were less bothered about owning things.

Staff: 270

Financials: made a pre-tax profit of £4.5m on £39.1m sales in 2016. Alderson said the business is set to make more than £60m sales this year.

Investment: Alderson still owns nearly 90% of the business but did a small equity deal last year to fuel growth.

News:

1. ranked 20th in The Sunday Times Profit Track 100 league table this year.

2. had to lay off 12 of his 18 staff during the credit crunch. However, Vanarama rebounded, and in 2014, it became title sponsor of non-league football’s national division.

MOO.COM: print & design - London

Meet Richard Moross: The tech veteran behind Moo.com | Russell Lynch, The Evening Standard. 22 June, 2018

DZ profile: Moo Print Limited (Moo.com)

Business: Online print and design company. Moo’s personalised cards, and a host of other products, are being printed at the rate of millions a month; the business has hundreds of thousands of customers in more than 190 countries, alongside bigger names such as Airbnb and WeWork. 85% of Moo’s sales are overseas but the big market is the US, an entrepreneurial nation where around 500,000 businesses are started every month.

Launched: 2004

Location: Farringdon, London

Founder: Richard Moross, 40. Has served as a non-exec on the board of Ladbrokes, and more recently with fashion retailer N Brown.

Staff: 500+ Former Carpetright boss Darren Shapland, chairman

Financials: £75m business …plans to hit £200m in 3 years. Debt Finance - Accomplice (FKA Atlas Venture); Barclays PLC

Investment: Investors - ATLAS VENTURE, THE ACCELERATOR GROUP, INDEX VENTURES and LOCALGLOBE. Initially raised £150,000 from Robin Klein, Index Ventures. A partnership with photo-sharing site FLICKR, allowing its users to print their images onto the company’s cards …helped win another round of investment. Richard Moross owns 25% of the firm.