A new £185m evergreen fund has been created with the aim of investing in businesses in the North West of England.
Commitments for the North West Fund came from North West Business Finance (NWBF) with support from the Northwest Regional Development Agency (NWDA), the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and the European Investment Bank. It’s the largest public fund of its kind in the UK and expects to create or safeguard over 14,000 jobs. The North West Fund is an umbrella name for the six funds that are now available to North West businesses in the form of debt, equity and quasi-equity. These funds are managed by six fund managers under contract with NWBF. NWBF oversees the delivery of the fund, under the European Investment Bank’s Joint European Resources for Micro to Medium Enterprises (JEREMIE) Initiative, in England’s North West. Initially, £170m of The North West Fund will be allocated to the six fund managers, which then have a mandate to invest their allocation into the specific product or sector they manage, before 31 December 2015. The £15m remaining will be available for further allocation and investment through to the end of 2015. The six funds of fund managers comprise YFM Private Equity (£45m), FW Capital (£35m), Enterprise Ventures (£30m), Spark Impact (£25m), CT Investment Partners (€20m) and AXM Venture Capital (£15m). “While it has taken longer than expected to establish, I believe that the North West Fund is now in a position to provide investment capital to a range of businesses across the region at a critical time. This funding will allow these businesses to deliver their own growth plans in what continue to be challenging economic times when the availability of alternative funding remains tight,” said Andy Leach, chief executive of NWBF. The North West Fund is now live and applications can be made online here. Picture sourceShare this story