Participated · Equity · Feb 2020

JUMO provides AI-powered lending, savings and banking infrastructure to banks, fintechs, eMoney operators and mobile network partners. Its core product set includes credit and savings products plus underwriting, KYC and fraud-detection services delivered as a platform. The company partners with MTN, Airtel, Tigo, Ecobank, Absa, Letshego, Mansa Bank and Telenor and operates in six African markets (Ghana, Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Zambia and Ivory Coast) and Pakistan. JUMO reports it has served more than 18 million customers and delivered over $3.5 billion in loans, with up to 120 million individual loans disbursed historically. It says current eMoney subscribers present an opportunity to disburse $29 billion a year, rising to $40 billion if it expands to Nigeria and Cameroon, and claims operational costs of $1 per customer per year against a 150 million customer total addressable market. The company plans to use new funding to expand financial products for small and medium businesses and provide longer-term lending options for merchants and larger businesses. JUMO provides a full technology stack that enables partners to build and run next-generation savings, lending and insurance products for entrepreneurs in emerging markets. The platform gives anyone with a cell phone and mobile wallet access to financial choice through partnerships with financial-service providers and mobile network operators. Since its founding in London in 2015, JUMO has served over 15 million customers and disbursed more than US$1.8 billion in loans. The company operates across six markets (Ghana, Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Zambia and Pakistan) and plans to enter Nigeria, Côte d’Ivoire and India this year. JUMO said it will use new funding to support expansion into new markets and to launch new products, and it highlighted increased tech hiring as part of its growth. Jumo designs and operates social-impact financial products such as microloans, savings and insurance for emerging-market consumers and partners. The company says it has originated more than $1 billion in loans and serves about 10 million people saving or borrowing on its platform. Jumo began in Tanzania in 2014 and has since expanded, moving its headquarters to Singapore and launching into Asia via Pakistan. It employs roughly 350 staff across 10 offices in Africa, Europe and Asia. Over the last year it doubled the number of financial-service providers and telcos on its platform and runs partnerships such as a digital finance product for Uber drivers in Kenya. Management has stated plans to expand to more Asian markets next year. Jumo builds social-impact financial products, offering loans and savings options for people and small businesses outside the formal banking system. The company says it has helped nine million consumers across six African markets and originated over $700 million in loans. It operates roughly 350 staff across 10 offices in Africa, Europe and Asia and was launched in 2014. Jumo assesses credit using alternative signals and partners with banks to scale volumes of small loans. The company has opened an office in Singapore, begun offering services in Pakistan and plans further expansion into additional Asian markets while continuing product expansion in Africa. Leadership includes CEO Andrew Watkins-Ball, and Jumo plans to introduce new generations of saving products and deepen bank partnerships as it scales. JUMO is a financial-services platform that delivers mobile financial services across emerging markets. The company operates in six African markets and Pakistan and has over 300 employees, most based in Cape Town. It is developing its platform to provide new services for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and is using recent funding to support expansion in Africa and Asia. JUMO is participating in Google Launchpad Accelerator and recently received a $150,000 prize from the Mastercard Foundation for client satisfaction. The CEO, Andrew Watkins-Ball, has highlighted the startup's focus on social impact when choosing financiers.

Led · Equity · Jan 2015

Westwing operates a daily-sales e-commerce platform offering home accessories and furniture across multiple markets. The company is active in 15 markets across three continents and employs more than 1,400 people worldwide. In fiscal 2013 Westwing reported €12m in net sales. The business has raised a total of €179m since its founding. The company intends to use the new funds to enhance its growth plans and further expand its position in the home & living market. Westwing operates an online home and living e‑commerce portal offering interior design brands and products, and reports more than 12 million members. The company sells curated home goods and in 2013 sold over 2.8 million products, with more than a third of sales on mobile. Westwing has rapidly grown net revenues—€0.5M in 2011, €41M in 2012 and €110M in 2013—and says it tripled net revenues in the last 2.5 years. It is active in ten markets including Germany, Italy, Brazil, Russia, France, Spain, Poland, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Austria. Management says the new funding will be used to reinforce Westwing’s position as a pioneer in the home & living e‑commerce market and to improve customer experience. The company estimates the global home & living market exceeds €400 billion annually and highlights its logistics setup and customer loyalty as strengths. Westwing is a Munich-based shopping club for home and living that sells home décor and furnishing products. Launched in August 2011 by Stefan Smalla, Delia Fischer, Georg Biersack, Matthias Siepe and Tim Schäfer, the company serves over 3 million members. It has rolled out operations to more than a dozen countries in Europe and worldwide. Westwing plans to use new capital to accelerate growth and to scale operations in each country where it is present. The company has raised $82M to date following the latest $50M funding round. The round underscores continued investor support as Westwing expands its market presence.

Led · Equity · Oct 2013

Oxford Nanopore Technologies Limited announced it received £195 million in funding on May 4, 2021. The financing was an equity round raised at a post-money valuation of £2.48 billion. The transaction included participation from new investors M&G Investment Management, Nikon Corporation, Temasek Holdings, and Wellington Management for £125 million, and existing investors including IP Group Plc for £70 million. M&G Investment Management invested £35 million, and IP Group Plc invested £18.7 million to hold a 14.5% stake in the company. The announced investor group comprised M&G Investment Management, Nikon Corporation, Temasek Holdings, Wellington Management Group LLP, IP Group Plc and other investors. Oxford Nanopore Technologies is described in the article as a sequencing unicorn and develops gene-sequencing devices. The piece reports the company recently raised $105.9M in new cash. That fundraising provided liquidity that allowed some investors to recoup cash. Investors associated with Neil Woodford’s former fund are explicitly mentioned as having recouped some cash. The coverage frames the transaction as offering relief for Woodford-associated funds. The article states the company closed the fundraising transaction. Oxford Nanopore develops portable, real-time long-read DNA/RNA sequencing devices (MinION, GridION, PromethION, Flongle) and uniquely enables direct RNA sequencing and modified-base detection. MinION has been commercially available since 2015 and is used by scientists in more than 70 countries. PromethION is a high-throughput, modular system—article notes >150Gb per PromethION flow cell in early 2018 and customers producing 70–100Gb per flow cell—enabling sub-$1,000 human genomes on long-read data. The company emphasizes simple sample preparation (5–10-minute kit, VolTRAX) and is developing single-test adapters (Flongle) and a forthcoming smartphone sequencer, SmidgION. Oxford Nanopore is expanding global operations with commercial presence in New York, US Cambridge, China, Japan, France and Germany, and new operations opening in Shanghai and San Francisco; new headquarters recently opened in Oxford. The company is scaling manufacturing and R&D to grow applications from infectious-disease surveillance and precision medicine to food- and water-safety monitoring and environmental science. Oxford Nanopore Technologies develops nanopore-based DNA/RNA sequencing platforms, led by the portable MinION. Its product portfolio includes the MinION, high-throughput PromethION, the VolTRAX automated sample/library preparation device, and the mobile-phone compatible SmidgION in its pipeline. The MinION has been commercially available since 2015 and is used by a community in more than 50 countries for real-time, long-read sequencing in lab and field settings. Oxford Nanopore also offers analysis solutions through Metrichor to make analyses accessible to non-experts. The company plans to expand commercial operations—particularly in Asia—add production and sales & marketing resources, and continue rapid improvement of existing products and development of its pipeline. Following the latest placement, the company has raised a total of £351 million. Oxford Nanopore Technologies develops and commercialises nanopore-based electronic systems for single-molecule analysis of DNA, RNA and proteins. Its product portfolio includes the handheld MinION, the high-throughput PromethION, the GridION system, and supporting tools such as VolTRAX for sample preparation and Metrichor for cloud-based real-time analysis. MinION was made commercially available in 2014 and registration has opened for the PromethION Early Access programme. The company focuses on real-time data streaming, improved simplicity, efficiency and scalability of workflows, and low total cost-of-ownership across scientific, medical, crop science, security and environmental applications. Oxford Nanopore raised new funding to support improvements to existing products and services, further develop and expand its pipeline, and expand manufacturing and commercial activities. The fundraising increases the company’s total funds raised to £251 million.