EMV Capital advised on £740k oversubscribed funding round for 5G and satellite phased array designer Sofant Technologies

NetScientific plc

(“NetScientific”, the “Group” or the “Company”)

EMV Capital advised on £740k oversubscribed funding round for 5G and satellite phased array designer Sofant Technologies

London, UK – 28 April 2021 – NetScientific plc (AIM: NSCI), the international life sciences and sustainability, technology investment and commercialisation group, announces that its corporate finance and venture capital division EMV Capital Ltd (“EMVC”) advised on a £740k oversubscribed top-up fundraise for its Advised Portfolio Company, designer Sofant Technologies (“Sofant”).

The fundraise builds on last year’s £2.3m pre-series A round for Sofant. Participation in the round included key existing investors, including Kelvin Capital and the Scottish Investment Bank. The funding round included a price per share uplift of 40% in less than one year since its last investment round in July 2020 – reflecting strong developments at Sofant over the period.

This transaction increases assets under advisory by EMVC by a further £420k to £2.7m.

Sofant is currently benefitting from a global wave of investment to upgrade broad-band satellite communication systems. The company also expects to benefit from the rollout of high band 5G networks across the UK and the rest of the world. It plans to use this new funding to expand its team, as the company accelerates its system integration with satellite network operators and other final users.

Since the 2020 investment round, Sofant has developed growing industry recognition, with support from global manufacturers and development partners. It has recently hired a CFO to support the scale-up of commercial activities within the business.

Amongst Sofant’s development programmes are prototype antenna arrays funded by the European Space Agency.

David Wither, CEO of Sofant CEO, commented: “Our engineering team continues to make significant progress on the development of our core technology platform. We have made great progress in the development of an ecosystem of corporate partners who will play key roles in the commercialization of Sofant’s disruptive, low power antenna technology. This top-up investment will help the company finalize several initiatives ahead of our upcoming series A funding round.” 

Dr. Ilian Iliev, CEO of NetScientific, commented : “Since our initial investment, we have seen the Sofant team make rapid progress in this strategically vital technology for the UK’s telecoms sector.

“In the aftermath of COVID-19, supply chain consolidation and strategic reliability has become a key priority for Western governments. Sofant is well-positioned as a homegrown, reliable partner in building safe, reliable and fast connectivity systems. Importantly Sofant is progressing well, reflecting the increasing value of the investment within our growing portfolio.”

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About NetScientific

NetScientific plc (AIM: NSCI) is a holding company, that invests in, develops, commercialises and realises shareholder value in life sciences/healthcare, sustainability and technology companies, which offer significant growth potential predominately in the UK and USA, as well as globally.

With the acquisition of EMV Capital in August 2020, the Group doubled its portfolio from 8 to 17 companies, either through direct subsidiary, balance sheet investment or capital under advisory, varying from start-up private companies to publicly listed equities.

NetScientific delivers shareholder returns through a proactive and hands-on management approach to their portfolio companies; identifying, investing in, and helping to build game-changing companies. The Group targets value inflection points and the release of value through partial or full exits from trade sales, public listings, or equity sales. The Company has a strong transatlantic and growing international presence, providing attractive expansion prospects.

NSCI can deploy a capital-light investment structure; utilising the power of the PLC Brand, and the NetScientific balance sheet to anchor future investments and achieve a multiplier effect by attracting 3rd party investment for the portfolio companies.

NetScientific is headquartered in London, United Kingdom, and was admitted to trading on AIM, a market operated by the London Stock Exchange, in 2013 (website: www.netscientific.net).

About Sofant

Sofant Technologies is a leading-edge radio technology company based in Edinburgh. The company is applying its proprietary RF MEMS technology to develop an extremely low power, low cost platform which solves power consumption and heat problems in 5G and satellite communications antenna systems. Sofant employs a fabless semiconductor business model which enables it to leverage long established high volume, low cost production methods. This positions Sofant to offer its customers game-changing performance with guaranteed scalability and low cost.