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Google Earth founder to helm Seraphim Capital’s £80m space tech fund

London-based investment firm Seraphim Capital has launched what it is claiming to be the world’s ‘largest ever’ early-stage, space sector, venture fund.

Focused on early-stage space technology businesses, the new fund is targeting an investment pot of £80m by the time it reaches its final close in the second quarter of 2017, having already received £30m investment from the British Business Bank.

The Seraphim Space Fund will look to investment in commercial applications for both software and hardware firms, as well as in technologies such as AI, robotics and nanomaterials which could have potential uses in space.

Seraphim’s Chief Executive, Mark Boggett, believes that low cost access to space will come to ‘define the decade ahead’ in much the same way that low cost personal computing and the internet defined the 1990s and 2000s.

He said: “The average person in the UK interacts with a satellite 30 times per day. Within five years we see that figure reaching 300 and by the end of the decade 3,000.

“Just as low cost personal computing in the 1990’s and the internet in the 2000’s acted as a catalyst for waves of new technology innovations, the evidence is that low cost access to space will come to define the decade ahead.

“There are exciting development opportunities emerging from very promising start-ups and we very much look forward to investing and supporting the best of these.”

Helmed by the founder of Google Earth, Michael Jones, who joins as Managing Partner, and partnered with the European Space Agency (ESA), the fund is set to be well connected to both Silicon Valley and the wider European space industry.

In addition, the Seraphim Space Fund is also set to support a range of initiatives by Satellite Applications Catapult and will provide backing to the creation of UK Space Tech Angels, as it angles for a central role in the UK’s space tech sector.

Keith Morgan, British Business Bank’s Chief Executive Officer, commented: “We are delighted to be backing the Seraphim team via our Enterprise Capital Funds programme. The UK space sector is already a major success story, representing a £12bn industry that has ambitious targets to triple in size over the next 15 years.

“Providing the best space-related start-ups with the funding they need to grow into global players will be a vital component if these targets are to be met.

“Through its combination of industry heavy-hitters, leading space-tech entrepreneurs and partnerships with the likes of the European Space Agency, we believe that the Seraphim Space Fund will be ideally placed to help make this vision a reality.”

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