£3million investment in Coleraine companies will improve outcomes for cancer and metabolic disease patients

Invest Northern Ireland has announced that two Coleraine SMEs are the first to receive investment from its £39million equity fund, Co-Fund III.

StimOxyGen and Dia Beta Labs, two life & health science spin-out companies from Ulster University, have each raised £1.5m of public and private funding to assist with their growth plans. These investment rounds have been directly supported and leveraged by Co-Fund III, one of three funds that make up Invest NI’s Access to Finance portfolio.

The new round of Access to Finance funding, with a potential total investment of more than £250m, was launched by Economy Minister Dr Caoimhe Archibald in May.

Welcoming the investments, the Minister said: “The Access to Finance funding is to assist our SMEs, start-ups and entrepreneurs and help address the private equity funding gap in the north.

"It is excellent to see that some of our innovative businesses are already benefiting from this fund, and in the area of Life and Health sciences, one of my Department’s priority sectors. By private and public sector working together, we are helping to enable businesses to not only contribute to our economic development, but importantly to advance medical breakthroughs.”

Steven Scullion, director of Corporate Finance at Invest NI, said: “Our Access to Finance portfolio provides an essential funding solution for start-ups and SMEs who may be constrained by lack of traditional finance, allowing them to scale to the next level.

“Our £39m investment into Co-Fund III, the third iteration of the fund, is expected to leverage over £60m from the private sector, opening up more than £100m for Northern Ireland SMEs. We encourage all SMEs with high export growth potential to consider equity investment to support their growth and take advantage of the opportunities and networks the fund provides.”

StimOxyGen is tackling the challenge of tumour hypoxia, where a lack of oxygen in solid tumours limits the effectiveness of standard cancer treatments such as radiotherapy.

Dia Beta Labs is tackling the metabolic disease epidemic through development of disease-modifying peptides which provide higher quality, more sustainable weight loss than current options in obesity.

Sian Farrell, chief executive of StimOxyGen, explained: “This investment will provide essential funding to progress our novel oxygen-generating nanoparticle (SGEN-33) towards first-in-human trials. Specifically, it enables completion of preclinical toxicology, manufacturing scale-up, and regulatory interactions in preparation for clinical evaluation.

"It also helps us to grow the team as we transition from a preclinical towards a clinical-stage company. This is a transformative step for our company and for patients with aggressive cancers such as pancreatic cancer, where treatment options remain limited.”

Ryan Lafferty, chief executive of Dia Beta Labs Ltd, continued: “As an R&D-stage biotech, accessing finance at this stage can be a challenge. This investment allows us to progress the manufacturing and late-stage preclinical toxicology of our lead program, bringing us significantly closer to first-in-human trials for this potentially transformative medicine.”

Co Fund III is managed by Clarendon Fund Managers Ltd on behalf of Invest NI. The fund typically invests between £150k and £500k into high-growth companies at any one time and can invest up to £2.5m across multiple investment rounds. Co-Fund III invests alongside private investors on a wholly commercial basis.

Stuart Gaffikin, senior investment manager at Clarendon Fund Managers Ltd, added: “Co-Fund invests in innovative, export driven companies across all sectors and all parts of Northern Ireland.

“Since the first Co Fund was established in 2011, the fund’s investment of £54m has leveraged over £335m from private and public investors into 109 companies, enabling them to create and maintain over 1,600 local jobs and sell their products around the world. We’re pleased to have invested in StimOxyGen and Dia Beta Labs to support this phase of their development.”