UK-based investment firm Seraphim Capital has launched the world’s first space technology-focused venture fund with a £50m ($62m) round featuring aerospace company Airbus, the Financial Times has reported.
Airbus set up a corporate venturing unit, Airbus Group Ventures, in June 2015 with $150m of capital. The fund targets companies operating in areas related to Airbus’s fields of interest, including aircraft and communications systems.
Electronic systems provider Thales, satellite services firm Telespazio, space equipment maker Com Dev and satellite operator Avanti also contributed to the first close of Seraphim Space Fund, as did UK state-owned development bank British Business Bank (BBB), which supplied £30m.
BBB and unnamed corporates have pledged another £30m for the second financing round, which is expected to close in April 2017, bringing the fund’s total size to £80m. The fund’s first investments will be made in early 2017, according to the FT.
Seraphim Space Fund is the brainchild of David Williams, chief executive of satellite operator Avanti Communications and chairman of the fund’s advisory board.
Williams saw a need for a venture capital fund to nurture space technology companies to meet the UK government’s target, set out in the National Space Policy, to triple the size of the sector to £40bn by 2030.
The fund will focus on early-stage companies using digital data from satellites to develop innovations across a wide range of industries, including intelligent transport, smart cities, insurance, maritime, agriculture and oil and gas.
European Space Agency (ESA), which has partnered the fund, will provide access to satellites as well as to potential portfolio companies through networks such as ESA’s 16 pan-European business incubators.
Michael Jones, founder of virtual map program Google Earth and a managing partner at Seraphim, will help extend the firm’s reach to Silicon Valley.