Oxford university VC firm OSE raises $232m
Oxford Science Enterprises has tapped the credit market to boost its capital as it anticipates an uptick in exits over the next few years.
Oxford Science Enterprises (OSE), an independent, £1.1bn ($1.45bn) investment company that backs University of Oxford spinouts, has raised £175m ($232m) in venture debt, one of the first early stage VCs of its kind to raise capital from banks.
“We’re more or less the first early-stage VC to have managed to obtain a secured NAV facility. We are the first company that has really gone to market and completed this. So it is groundbreaking,” says Jim Wilkinson, chief financial officer at Oxford Science Enterprises.
Oxford Science Enterprise invests in spinouts and startups from the UK’s Oxford cluster at the pre-seed and seed stage. It writes cheques between £50,000 and £25m, and will do follow-on financings for portfolio companies all the way to exit. The new capital will ensure its investments are fully funded.
Wilkinson says it was much less expensive to tap venture debt than equity, which has a comparable cost of between 15% and 20% for riskier assets.
