The Universities of
Leeds,
Manchester and
Sheffield are launching a new investment company to help boost the commercialisation of university spin-outs and start-ups in the North of England.
The company, called
Northern Gritstone, will fund spin-out enterprises from each institution using external capital raised from a range of different investors. These businesses will either be newly formed start-ups or ones historically founded by or linked to the universities. The company also aims to be a key part of the Government’s ‘Build Back Better’ levelling up agenda and Plan for Growth in the North.
The three universities initially came together in 2018 to create the Northern Triangle Initiative and secured a £5 million award from the Research England Connecting Capabilities Fund (CCF). By 2020 the CCF had supported around 20 commercially viable projects, substantially improving commercialisation rates across the three universities, and generating a sustainable pipeline of university spin-outs.
Northern Gritstone will build on this successful collaboration by providing significant start-up and follow-on funding to support the intellectual property (IP) developed at Leeds, Manchester, and Sheffield. Northern Gritstone plans to raise up to £500 million from strategic corporate partners, institutional investors and qualifying individuals.
Funding for a diverse range of companiesIf successful, the financing will make Northern Gritstone one of the largest dedicated investors into the commercialisation of university science and technology related IP in the UK. It will provide funding for a diverse range of companies across areas such as advanced materials and manufacturing, health and life sciences, artificial intelligence, and data sciences.
Professor Dave Petley, vice-president for innovation at the University of Sheffield, said: “Northern Gritstone is the culmination of a great deal of hard work and collaboration between three of the country’s leading research universities, but we are just at the beginning of a project that has immense potential for everyone, from investors to researchers.
“The combination of a globally significant cluster of highly innovative activity and large-scale investment power will drive the rapid scale-up of firms at the forefront of sectors based on technologies such as health and life sciences, AI and data analytics, advanced materials and manufacturing.”