SyndicateRoom is a UK

venture capital fund Venture capital (often abbreviated as VC) is a form of private equity financing that is provided by venture capital firms or funds to startups, early-stage, and emerging companies that have been deemed to have high growth potential or which hav ...

, headquartered in

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...

, founded by Gonçalo de Vasconcelos and Tom Britton in September 2013. The company is authorised and regulated by the

Financial Conduct Authority The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) is a financial regulation, financial regulatory body in the United Kingdom, but operates independently of the UK Government, and is financed by charging fees to members of the financial services industry. The ...

. SyndicateRoom initially launched as an

equity crowdfunding Equity crowdfunding is the online offering of private company securities to a group of people for investment and therefore it is a part of the capital markets. Because equity crowdfunding involves investment into a commercial enterprise, it ...

platform for

high-net-worth individuals High-net-worth individual (HNWI) is a term used by some segments of the financial services industry to designate persons whose investible wealth (assets such as stocks and bonds) exceeds a given amount. Typically, these individuals are defined ...

and

angel investors An angel investor (also known as a business angel, informal investor, angel funder, private investor, or seed investor) is an individual who provides capital for a business or businesses start-up, usually in exchange for convertible debt or owners ...

. In October 2019, the company announced that it would adopt a

venture capital Venture capital (often abbreviated as VC) is a form of private equity financing that is provided by venture capital firms or funds to startups, early-stage, and emerging companies that have been deemed to have high growth potential or which ha ...

fund investment model, and would no longer offer individual

crowdfunding Crowdfunding is the practice of funding a project or venture by raising money from a large number of people, typically via the internet. Crowdfunding is a form of crowdsourcing and alternative finance. In 2015, over was raised worldwide by crow ...

investment opportunities.

History

SyndicateRoom was founded by Gonçalo de Vasconcelos and Tom Britton on 21 September 2013. The pair met while studying at the

Cambridge Judge Business School Cambridge Judge Business School is the business school of the University of Cambridge. The School is a provider of management education. It is named after Sir Paul Judge, a founding benefactor of the school. The School is considered to be par ...

at the

University of Cambridge , mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts. Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge. , established = , other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...

. In April 2014, SyndicateRoom was named Startup of the Year by

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...

Small Business Showcase. In June 2014, SyndicateRoom investors committed £700,000 to Radio Physics Solutions, a startup which builds technology to detect

3D printed 3D printing or additive manufacturing is the construction of a three-dimensional object from a CAD model or a digital 3D model. It can be done in a variety of processes in which material is deposited, joined or solidified under computer co ...

guns. In May 2015, SyndicateRoom raised £1.2m in

seed funding Seed money, sometimes known as seed funding or seed capital, is a form of securities offering in which an investor invests capital in a startup company in exchange for an equity stake or convertible note stake in the company. The term ''seed'' su ...

on its own

platform. In March 2016, SyndicateRoom was the first crowdfunding platform to offer public market investment opportunities after being accepted as a member company of the

London Stock Exchange London Stock Exchange (LSE) is a stock exchange in the City of London, England, United Kingdom. , the total market value of all companies trading on LSE was £3.9 trillion. Its current premises are situated in Paternoster Square close to St Pau ...

, although it has since closed down the public markets area of its platform. In May 2016, SyndicateRoom raised £3.1m funding in

series A round A series A round (also known as series A financing or series A investment) is the name typically given to a company's first significant round of venture capital financing. The name refers to the class of preferred stock sold to investors in exchan ...

led by

Abcam Abcam is a producer, distributor and seller of protein research tools. History The company was founded in 1998 by Jonathan Milner with co-founders professor Tony Kouzarides and David Cleevely, with the idea of making it easier for research scie ...

founder Jonathan Milner. In June 2016, SyndicateRoom launched FundTwenty8, the first passive

Enterprise Investment Scheme The Enterprise Investment Scheme (EIS) is a series of UK tax reliefs launched in 1994 in succession to the Business Expansion Scheme. It is designed to encourage investments in small unquoted companies carrying on a qualifying trade in the United Ki ...

fund. In July 2019, Gonçalo de Vasconcelos stepped down as CEO and was replaced by Graham Schwikkard. In September 2019, SyndicateRoom launched Access EIS, the first data-driven Enterprise Investment Scheme fund. In October 2019, the company announced that it would adopt a new fund-first investment model, and would no longer offer individual

investment opportunities. In April 2020, SyndicateRoom invested in

Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

-based laundry startup Oxwash, alongside

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

co-founder

Biz Stone Christopher Isaac "Biz" Stone (born March 10, 1974) is an American entrepreneur who is a co-founder of Twitter, among other technology companies. Stone was the creative director at Xanga from 1999 to 2001. Stone co-founded Jelly, with Ben Finkel ...

. In March 2022, SyndicateRoom invested in London-based startup Slip.

References

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External links

Official website
Venture capital firms of the United Kingdom Financial services companies established in 2013 2013 establishments in England