A top UK-based corporate venturing executive and an adviser to a government body designed to promote investment in the UK warned innovative start-ups have insufficient funding in the country, and called for further overseas and venture capital investment.
The executives were speaking in the opening panel session of Global Corporate Venturing’s two day event in London on Monday.
Bruce Beckloff, vice president of corporate business development at UK-based micro-processing company Arm, said his company had begun its corporate venturing programme because it was concerned there was not enough financial investment in the start-ups which were of interest to it. He said: "We saw the venture capital community was no longer supporting the kind of investment we want to invest in. There was a particularly poignant lack of early stage capital"
Jerry Ennis, strategic adviser to the venture unit of UK Trade & Investment [UKTI], a UK government body designed to promote investment in the UK, speaking personally rather than on behalf of his organisation, said UKTI wanted to encourage foreign sources capital to come into the country, because funding availability for start-ups has been hit. He said: "Venture capital overall is changing and the amount of money provided to UK entrepreneurs is diminishing. Government sees money for start-ups is split in a myriad of ways."
However, the pair were joined on the panel by a corporate venturing representative of US-based automotive company General Motors, who said the company had opened an office in the UK because it had been offered good investment opportunities.
Jerneja Loncar, an investment manager at GM Ventures, said: "We started investing in the US because that was what we knew best. Yet we found it was difficult to get things done internationally, flying out. We are noticing we are building a better relationship being on the ground." She added GM Ventures needed to see a tie to the company’s core automotive business although it did invest capital in innovative business models such as car sharing.
Beckloff added the country should look to changing not only the level of wider venture capital investment, but also the general interest in the country in entrepreneurship. He said: "There are very few places with access to capital like the UK. Yet I do not see a vibrant non-corporate ecosystem… I want to go to a dinner party in London and talk about entrepreneurship. At least I want somebody to know who Arm is. Then we would be in a good place."
Ennis added: "UKTI wants to cover every sector. We want to see areas like clean tech, social media and life sciences adequately catered to."