Angel investors provide tech firms with £2m lift

Two Scottish technology start-ups have together secured more than £2 million in funding from indigenous angel investors as they look to ramp up growth in 2016.
Administrate offices in Edinburgh. Picture: GoogleAdministrate offices in Edinburgh. Picture: Google
Administrate offices in Edinburgh. Picture: Google

The bigger of the two deal involves Edinburgh-based Administrate, whose learning management software has attracted industry plaudits and which already employs 35 people at its CodeBase HQ in the capital.

It has secured £1.7 million in an oversubscribed funding round led by Scottish angel syndicate Archangels.

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The company has seen its team triple in size during the past 12 months in response to a surge in demand for its products from North America, the UK and the Middle East, making Administrate one of Scotland’s fastest growing tech businesses.

The firm sells its software to large organisations that “struggle to define, manage, report on and sustain employee engagement in relation to training”. It is estimated that the average company spends more than £1,200 per employee per year but faces a challenge trying to accurately track this spend and measure engagement.

John Peebles, chief executive of Administrate, said: “This year has been incredible. We’ve built an amazing team delivering success to our global customer base, supported by our investors and in keeping with our company values. We’re just getting started and are looking forward to an even better year in 2016.”

The company has previously raised £1.9m from investors Archangel, TRI Cap and the Scottish Co-Investment Fund.

Meanwhile, Scottish investment groups have united to provide a laser technology specialist with some £500,000 in financial backing.

Chromacity, a Heriot-Watt spin-out company, makes lasers for the life-sciences industry and spectroscopy market. As well as laser technology, the firm’s embedded web server allows wireless operation from any laptop, tablet or smartphone.

The total investment of £520,000 will provide growth capital for the business to increase its development capacity as it commercialises the technology for a wider range of applications.

The investment was led by EOS Technology Investment Syndicate, which was joined by business syndicate Kelvin Capital and matched funding from the Scottish Investment Bank. Investing Women Angels, a syndicate of female entrepreneurs, has also contributed to the initial funding round.

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Chromacity boss Christopher Leburn said: “We are about to launch a new product to the market and the confidence of the investors in the company, as well as the funding itself, is a tremendous boost.”

The investors were advised by the start-up and investment team at law firm Harper Macleod.

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