AAA November 2012 – Page 16

Waste2Tricity’s road leads to Rome

Waste2Tricity, a UK-based energy-from-waste firm, has sold 10% of its shares to Ervington Investments, an investment vehicle for Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich who owns local football club Chelsea FC after being a controlling shareholder in oil major Sibneft after its privatization from the Russian state in 1995. Paul Heagren, a director of Chelsea FC, will… Continue reading Waste2Tricity’s road leads to Rome

Tate & Lyle sweetens second fund

Tate & Lyle, a London-listed sugar maker, has committed £30m ($50m) to its second corporate venturing fund that will have an eight-year investment period. From January, Tate & Lyle Ventures II will invest in eight to 10 start-ups and expansion-stage companies in both developed and emerging markets in food sciences and enabling technologies to support… Continue reading Tate & Lyle sweetens second fund

Trademob gathers $15m

Trademob, the Germany-based mobile marketing platform backed by local retailer Tengelmann’s corporate venturing unit, has raised $15m in its series B round. Growth equity firm Kennet Partners invested $12.5m of the B round, with the remainder coming from existing investors Tengelmann Ventures and High-Tech Gründerfonds (HTGF), a state- and corporate-backed early-stage investment firm. Tengelmann Ventures… Continue reading Trademob gathers $15m

ClipClock times $2.5m investment

ClipClock, a Russia-based service to mark time on an online video backed by seed money from software provider Microsoft, has raised $2.5m in its series A round. Global TechInnovations incubated ClipClock and it raised $50,000 from Microsoft’s seed fund and $200,000 from angels. Venture capital firm Runa Capital funded the A round. Maria Netaeva at… Continue reading ClipClock times $2.5m investment

Takeda conveys Envoy purchase

Takeda Pharmaceutical, a Japan-based drugs company, has agreed to buy one of its corporate venturing unit’s portfolio companies, Envoy Therapeutics, for up to $140m. Takeda Ventures invested in Envoy’s $8m series A round in October 2009 and partnered with the developer of drugs for neurological and psychiatric diseases. The other investors in the A round… Continue reading Takeda conveys Envoy purchase

Google firepower upped by 50% to $300m

Reported move is the second consecutive year that Google Ventures has had its allocation increased. Google Ventures managing partner Bill Maris is quoted by news provider Reuters as saying that Google chief executive Larry Page has repeatedly asked what the firm could do with $1bn.

HTGF, STIFT back JeNaCell

High-Tech-Gründerfonds, the Germany state- and corporate-backed fund, and the Thüringen Foundation for Technology Innovation, and Research [Stift] have invested €700,000 ($1m) in JeNaCell, a biomaterial spin-off of the Friedrich Schiller University Jena (FSU), on 12 October. JeNaCell’s biomaterial (pictured) can be used for making medical and cosmetic products, suitable for treating poorly healing wounds, as… Continue reading HTGF, STIFT back JeNaCell