Oxford Nanopore announces ?40m fundraising

RNS Number : 0468Q

IP Group PLC

09 October 2013

 



FOR RELEASE ON

09 October 2013

IP Group plc - Portfolio company Oxford Nanopore announces £40m fundraising

IP Group plc (LSE: IPO) ("IP Group" or "the Company" or "the Group"), the developer of intellectual property based businesses, is pleased to note that portfolio company Oxford Nanopore Technologies Limited ("Oxford Nanopore"), a spin-out company from the University of Oxford that specialises in nanopore-based electronic molecular analysis systems, has raised £40 million in new funding via a private placement of ordinary shares.

The investment was received from new and existing investors in the US, UK and mainland Europe. New investors include Odey Asset Management. Funds will be used to further develop Oxford Nanopore's commercial and manufacturing infrastructure, continue innovative research and development in nanopore sensing, and for various corporate objectives including the building and defence of its broad intellectual property portfolio.

Following completion of the financing round, IP Group's undiluted beneficial stake of 19.6% in Oxford Nanopore will be valued at £104.3 million. The fundraising will result in a further unrealised fair value gain to IP Group of £33.3 million. IP Group and IP Venture Fund have committed £4.5 million and £0.3 million respectively to the fundraising. This transaction brings the total funds raised by Oxford Nanopore since its foundation in 2005 to £145 million.

For more information, please contact:

IP Group plc	www.ipgroupplc.com
Alan Aubrey, Chief Executive Officer	[phone]
Liz Vaughan-Adams, Communications	[phone] / [phone] [e-mail]
FTI Consulting (for IP Group)
Ben Atwell, John Dineen	[phone]
Oxford Nanopore	www.nanoporetech.com
Zoe McDougall, Communications	[phone] x2013 [e-mail]

Notes for editors

About IP Group

IP Group is a leading UK intellectual property ("IP") commercialisation company, developing technology innovations primarily from its research intensive partner universities. The Group offers more than traditional venture capital, providing its companies with access to business building expertise, networks, recruitment and business support.

The Company's portfolio comprises holdings in over 70 companies including Oxford Nanopore, the DNA sequencing development company, Revolymer, best known for its removable chewing gum, and Xeros, which has received many accolades for its revolutionary clothes washing techniques with a much reduced requirement for water.

The portfolio includes early stage to mature businesses and has exposure to five main sectors - Energy & Renewables, Medical Equipment & Supplies, Pharma & Biotech, IT & Communications and Chemicals & Materials. To date, fifteen of the portfolio companies IP Group has backed have listed on the AIM market of the London Stock Exchange and one on ISDX.

Founded in 2001, IP Group listed on AIM in October 2003 and moved to the Official List in June 2006.

For more information, please visit our website at www.ipgroupplc.com.

About Oxford Nanopore

Oxford Nanopore Technologies® is developing a new generation of nanopore-based electronic systems for analysis of single molecules including DNA, RNA and proteins.  The GridION™ system and miniaturised MinION™ device are designed  to provide novel qualities in molecular sensing such as real-time data streaming, improved simplicity, efficiency and scalability of workflows and direct analysis of the molecule of interest.  The devices may be used use in scientific research, personalised medicine, crop science, security & defence and environmental applications.

Oxford Nanopore has licensed or owns more than 350 patents and patent applications that relate to many aspects of nanopore sensing from protein nanopores to solid state nanopores and for the analysis of DNA, proteins and other molecules. This includes the use of functionalised solid-state nanopores for molecular characterisation, methods of fabricating solid-state nanopores and modifications of solid-state nanopores to adjust sensitivity or other parameters.

www.nanoporetech.com

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