Atlantic Bridge unveils €140m fund for tech firms

Specialist Irish technology investor Atlantic Bridge has launched a

€140 million fund aimed at tech companies with potential global market scalability.

Called Atlantic Bridge III, the Dublin-based fund's local backers include Enterprise Ireland, the Ireland Strategic Investment Fund (ISIF) and AIB.

AIB has also become the strategic banking partner to all of the Atlantic Bridge funds. The Ballsbridge-based financial institution is the largest bank seed fund investor in Ireland with commitments currently totalling €110 million to 138 companies across eight funds.

Atlantic Bridge plans to invest in 20 companies with investments in seven set to close shortly. The fund will focus on scaling Irish and European companies in high-growth enterprise technology sectors such as cloud, big data, augmented and virtual reality software, robotics and the internet of things.

It plans to invest in companies with a solid business model. The fund will help them to scale up their businesses to take on big international markets like the United States and China.

Atlantic Bridge has also attracted new investors to this fund, including a number of institutional pension funds, and British Business Bank Investments Ltd, the commercial arm of the British Business Bank, a UK government-owned entity.

Brian Long, founder and managing partner of Atlantic Bridge, said the fund has a number of “pipeline investments” already identified for the new fund and he was “confident” that it would build on the track record of success of its previous investments.

ISIF director Eugene O’Callaghan said the State-owned fund was “excited to continue” its relationship with Atlantic Bridge having previously supported fund number two.

“This investment aligns with our dual objectives of generating economic impact and financial returns and we look forward to seeing it support rapidly growing Irish companies in accessing customers, investors and partners in global markets in the US, China and Europe,” he said.

ISIF is a successor to the National Pension Reserve Fund with about

€7.5 billion to invest on a commercial basis in a manner designed to support economic activity in Ireland.

Atlantic Bridge is one of the largest technology funds in Europe, with offices in Dublin, London, Silicon Valley, Beijing and Hong Kong.

It has led investment of more than €100 million in Irish companies since it was formed.

The latest fund brings its total assets under management to €400 million.

Atlantic Bridge also co-manages a US$100m China Ireland Technology Fund with its Chinese partner West Summit Capital.

Examples of scaled Atlantic Bridge portfolio companies include Movidius, FieldAware, PolarLake, Metaio, Swrve and Glonav.

It currently has more than 20 companies in its funds’ portfolio and has achieved 12 realisations with proceeds totaling €1.7 billion.