Deepbridge Portfolio Company Secures €16m of funding for European expansion

Deepbridge Capital, the leading Enterprise Investment Scheme investment fund manager has today announced that portfolio company AlgaeCytes has secured €16m of funding to develop a commercial plant in Germany.  AlgaeCytes is a portfolio company within the Deepbridge Technology Growth EIS.

Sustainable Omega-3 producer AlgaeCytes (comprising of UK based AlgaeCytes Ltd and its wholly owned subsidiary AlgaeCytes Germany GmbH) has agreed a €5m funding round with German private equity provider, IBG Risikokapitalfonds III GmbH & Co. KG (IBG), alongside an €11m commitment from the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy’s GRW investment programme. 

IBG’s funding reflects their single largest investment in a growth project within the German province of Saxony-Anhalt. 

The agreed funding will be used by AlgaeCytes Germany to build, in Dessau, Saxony-Anhalt, one of Europe’s largest bioreactors facility; producing vegan, non GMO, and plant based Omega 3 Eicosapentaenoic Acid (EPA) oils for the food and biopharmaceutical markets.

This €60m project has secured the rights to a 100,000 square meter property, currently owned and managed by the city of Dessau, which is expected to be operational in early 2023. 

AlgaeCytes Limited has to date been funded by venture capital specialists, Deepbridge Capital, via the UK’s Enterprise Investment Scheme, and Kent County Council.

Andrew J Cosentino, Director at AlgaeCytes, commented; “Our commitment to this project and to the region has been steadfast. The support the city of Dessau, and the region of Saxony-Anhalt, has provided AlgaeCytes has been reinforced by the signing of this term sheet with IBG. We are confident this will be the first of many projects in the region and Germany.”

Ian Warwick, Managing Partner at Deepbridge Capital, added; “This is another example of a great EIS-funded company scaling and attracting significant co-funding to support its growth plans. As a highly innovative, sustainable-tech company, AlgaeCytes represents exactly the type of growth-focused company that the Enterprise Investment Scheme was designed to support.  Attracting substantial co-funding highlights the commercial progress that the Company is making.  We look forward to working with AlgaeCytes on this exciting next stage of their journey.”