18 VCT Funds to Pitch Your Startup to in 2024

Published in

Mountside Ventures

7 min read6 days ago

Founders, if you’ve been following our series on tax-advantaged early-stage investment funds like SEIS & EIS, you might have guessed what’s next. Without further ado, I present to you … Venture Capital Trusts (VCTs).

Background of VCTs:

A Venture Capital Trust is a publicly listed investment vehicle managed by an investment management group. It allocates capital to private, early-staged technology companies ready for growth. VCTs typically fall into two categories: generalist (investors seeking diversification over different industries/sectors) and specialist (investors focused on specific industries/sectors). Similarly to SEIS and EIS, investing in VCTs provides investors with tax benefits (such as income tax relief, tax-free capital gains & dividends) and provides founders with an additional source of financing.

Your startup is eligible for VCT investment if:

It has no more than £15m in gross assets at the time of investment.
It has fewer than 250 employees at the time of investment (or fewer than 500 for a ‘knowledge-intensive’ company).
Its shares are not quoted on a recognised stock exchange.
It is not controlled by another company.
All VCT investments into qualifying companies made on or after 15 March 2018 must meet the ‘risk to capital’ condition.

You can obtain VCT investment by:

Working with us! Mountside Ventures is recognised as one of the (only) friendly names amongst all types of early-stage investors, particularly the VCT community. We have a proven ability to support founders in securing this type of capital and understand exactly what it takes to do so. If you’re eager to learn more about fundraising from VCT investors, please reach out to the team. You can reach me on bheven@mountsideventures.com.

At a minimum, you should provide your investors with:

A captivating pitch deck: Notoriously, investors are known to spend less than 3 minutes looking through a pitch deck, so it pays to make each slide and word count. We’ve supported hundreds of founders in efficiently and effectively showcasing their vision, traction, and growth expectations to capture investors’ attention and interest.
A strong financial model: We understand that projecting future revenues can feel like gazing into a crystal ball. Having supported multiple founders in building their models, we know that investors want to qualify, through numbers, whether your startup has the potential to return their fund and whether you’re sustainably building your business.

You should take VCT money if:

As a founder, you should consider taking VCT money if you place a higher value on building sustainably rather than exponentially. Similarly to EIS funds, VCT funds target more conservative growth expectations of 5x — 10x due to the de-risked nature of their investments, which are supplemented by the tax benefits they provide from the outset. Traditional Venture Capitalists typically expect 50x-100x outcomes and, therefore, are more inclined to encourage growth at all costs in a shorter period of time.

VCTs you should pitch to:

If you read the above and are now thinking that VCTs could be a fit for you, consider pitching your startup to the below 18 VCT investors in 2024.

1. Albion VC

Albion Capital is a London-based investment firm that was founded in 1996. Albion Capital manages six VCTs, including Albion Development, Albion Enterprise, Albion Technology & General, Crown Place and Kings Arms Yard VCTs. The team explores opportunities in health tech, fintech, digital risk, and AI & data.

2. Beringea

Beringea is a private equity firm with offices in London and the US. The firm manages a number of VCTs, including ProVen VCT and ProVen Growth & Income VCT. Beringea invests in a range of sectors, including tech, media, and healthcare. Particularly those that are already profitable, or where the manager sees a clear path to profitability and has US expansion plans.

3. Blackfinch

Blackfinch Ventures is an investment management firm established in 1996. The firm manages the Blackfinch Spring VCT and focuses on investing in early-stage technology-enabled companies with a strong emphasis on R&D and innovation. Blackfinch aims to invest in a wide range of sectors and stages of maturity, although it prefers Series A funding rounds.

4. Calculus

Calculus Capital is a private equity firm based in London that manages Calculus VCT and invests in B2B and healthcare companies. They take a generalist stance toward investing, but its current areas of interest include technology, healthcare, and entertainment.

5. Foresight

Foresight Group is an SME investor who has supported companies for close to four decades. They manage several VCTs, including Foresight, Foresight Enterprise and Foresight Technology VCTs. Foresight is sector agnostic however they favour semiconductors, future of mobility, future of manufacturing, AR, VR, and immersive technologies, robotics, future of computing, advanced simulation and medtech and scientific instrumentation

6. Fuel Ventures

Fuel Ventures manages the Fuel Ventures VCT. They invest into early-stage, revenue-generating, digital businesses, usually marketplaces, platforms, and SaaS companies.

7. Gresham House Ventures

Gresham House Ventures is a private equity firm that manages several VCTs, including the Baronsmead Venture Trust & the Baronsmead Second Venture Trust. Gresham House invests in a range of sectors, including tech, healthcare, and consumer brands.

8. Guinness Ventures

Guinness is an asset management firm based in London that manages the Guinness VCT, and invests sector-agnostically.

9. Maven Capital Partners

Maven Capital Partners is an investment management firm based in the Midlands that also manages four VCTs and invests in established, entrepreneurial businesses, led by proven management teams. Particularly defensive or counter-cyclical sectors with recurring or contractual revenue and which it can access at attractive entry multiples.

10. Mercia Ventures VCT

Mercia Asset Management is an investment management firm that manages three Northern VCTs. Mercia invests agnostically. However, they have a strong presence in the healthcare and technology sectors.

11. Molten Ventures

Molten Ventures is a private equity firm that manages a VCT and invests at a slightly later stage across a range of sectors, including consumer technology, enterprise technology, hardware and deeptech and digital health and wellness.

12. Octopus Investments

Octopus Investments manages Octopus Titan VCT, Octopus Apollo VCT and Octopus Future Generations VCT.

Titan VCT focuses on the fintech, health tech, deep tech, consumer, climate, biotech, and B2B software sectors. Apollo VCT focuses on commercialised businesses with a bias towards B2B software that is ripe for increasing sales and marketing efforts or expanding into new locations or markets. FGVCT targets ambitious businesses with the potential to transform outdated industries for the better while also demonstrating excellent growth prospects.

13. Pembroke

Pembroke is a Venture Capital fund based in London that manages Pembroke VCT and invests mainly in the consumer, B2B business services, and technology spaces.

14. Praetura Ventures

Praetura Ventures manages the Praetura Growth VCT and invests in early-stage businesses in a range of sectors, including AI, gaming, healthtech, life sciences and cybersecurity. They have a preference for B2B business models across these sectors.

15. Puma

Puma manages the Puma Alpha VCT and Puma VCT 13, and invests sector agnostically.

16. Seneca Partners

Seneca Partners is a private equity firm in the North of the UK that manages the Seneca Growth Capital VCT, and invests in a range of sectors, including healthcare, energy, and tech. The investor is sector agnostic, but they have a preference for the life sciences and technology sectors

17. Triplepoint Ventures

Triplepoint Ventures is a private equity firm based in London that manages Triplepoint VCT and invests in a range of sectors. They invest into B2B companies solving challenges faced by large corporates.

18. YFM Equity Partners

YFM Equity Partners is a private equity firm that manages several VCTs, including British Smaller Companies VCT and invests in a range of sectors, including tech, healthcare, and consumer brands with a focus on B2B companies.Whilst they will are sector agnostic, they prefer the data, application software, tech-enabled services, and new media sectors.

How can we help?

Mountside Ventures is an award-winning accelerator and advisory firm, specialising in early-stage fundraising and exits, on a mission to optimise the fundraising process for founders and funds. For pre-seed and seed startups, we run free investment accelerator programmes. For Series A and Series B companies, we provide fractional CFO and fundraising support, enabling them to raise their Next Round of funding faster, and more efficiently and causing the least disruption to their business.

With our expertise and resources, we empower startups to present a compelling case to VCT investors and maximise their chances of success in securing funding.

If you’re raising your next round in the next 6–9 months, get in touch with us here or reach me directly via email at bheven@mountsideventures.com for an intro call.