27/02/2025
It is very welcome news that Cambridge Innovation Capital has just launched a £100 million fund (around US$125 million) to invest in growth stage companies. While Cambridge is considered the world’s leading science and technological cluster by intensity, it is thought that one reason why companies with great technology haven’t successfully scaled has been a lack of availability of investment funds for scaling-up. The fund is to focus on two areas where Cambridge has historically excelled – tech and life sciences innovation. The fund has already invested in Riverlane and Pragmatic Semiconductor. Riverlane’s mission is to make quantum computing useful. Pragmatic Semiconductor is developing ultra-thin, ultra low-cost integrated circuits.
This news is on the back of Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves’s significant announcement a month ago with her plans to deliver the Oxford-Cambridge Growth Corridor that may boost the UK economy by up to £78 billion by 2035 (around US$100 billion). In the Cambridge ecosystem, these plans include support for the University of Cambridge’s proposal for a new large scale innovation hub in the city centre, a new Cambridge Cancer Research Hospital, as well as extensive investment in infrastructure and pragmatism in planning regulations to enable this to happen quickly. Infrastructure improvements include rail and road improvements between Cambridge and Oxford; 4,500 new homes being built (roughly a 10% increase in homes that currently house a population of about 125,000 people); and massive investment in water storage and supply that has been neglected for decades.
Reddie & Grose has been proud to support the protection of intellectual property from our offices in Cambridge since they opened in 1996, and we look forward to continuing to support the Cambridge ecosystem for many years to come.
This article is for general information only. Its content is not a statement of the law on any subject and does not constitute advice. Please contact Reddie & Grose LLP for advice before taking any action in reliance on it.
