UK Science & Innovation Seed Fund
c/o STFC Innovations Ltd, Harwell Campus, Didcot, Oxfordshire, OX11 0QX, United Kingdom
Overview
The UK Innovation & Science Seed Fund is backed by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and the Fund’s partners are 9 publicly funded research bodies, including STFC, BBSRC, NERC and Dstl. The Fund is independently managed by venture capital specialist Midven. They help build companies from great science developed in laboratories, science and technology campuses and synthetic biology. They hold investments in some of the UK’s most innovative companies, in areas as diverse as novel antibiotics, research into Alzheimer’s disease, “green” chemicals and airport security.
- Total investments
- 1
- Lead investments
- 0
- Investments · 12mo
- 0
- Active investors
- 0
Sector focus
- Biotechnology
- Financial Services
- Venture Capital
Investment portfolio
- Tropic Biosciences
Participated · Series B · Jun 2020
Tropic Biosciences develops gene-edited tropical crops via its proprietary GEiGS® platform, concentrating on banana and rice varieties designed for higher yields, increased disease resistance, and improved sustainability. In 2025 the company launched the first new banana varieties in more than 75 years, including a non-browning banana named one of TIME Magazine’s Best Inventions of 2025 and an extended shelf-life variety that increases green life by 12 days and can reduce waste by up to 50 percent. Tropic has made progress toward resistance to Panama Disease TR4 and shipped plants in 2025 to establish a mother plantation intended to support commercial deployment beginning in 2027. Demand for its new banana varieties has already surpassed supply, and the company has cited significant revenue growth as it scales. Tropic plans to expand its research across its rice portfolio and pursue additional high-impact, climate-resilient crops to address global food security and sustainability challenges.
Team
No current team members are available.