University Partrnership
Evolution Group PLC
16 May 2003
16 May 2003
The Evolution Group Plc
Evolution Group subsidiary, IP2IPO, forms university partnership with King's
College London
IP2IPO Group Limited ("IP2IPO"), a subsidiary of the AIM listed investment bank
and fund management group, The Evolution Group Plc, is pleased to announce that
it has entered into a partnership with King's College London, one of the UK's
most prestigious research led universities.
Key points:
• IP2IPO will invest £5 million in spin out companies from King's College
London over a five year period in return for equity stakes in those
companies and has committed to extend this amount by a further £5 million by
the tenth anniversary of the partnership.
• IP2IPO will work with KCL Enterprises Ltd., the College's technology
transfer group, to help identify and progress commercialisation
opportunities. IP2IPO will supply KCL Enterprises Ltd. with additional
resources to augment its existing capabilities.
• IP2IPO will receive 20% of King's College London's interest in spin out
companies and technology licences.
This partnership is IP2IPO's third university partnership and has a term of 25
years. IP2IPO's other partnerships are with the University of Oxford and the
University of Southampton.
King's College London
King's College London is one of the best known universities in the UK. It was
established in 1829, but in more recent times has expanded through mergers with
the Institute of Psychiatry and the United Medical and Dental Schools of Guys
and St Thomas' Hospitals. The University has invested heavily in its
infrastructure and is now in the final stages of a £350 million redevelopment
programme.
The College has an enviable research reputation (24 of its departments were
rated 5 or 5* - the top grades - in the 2001 Research Assessment Exercise) and
is one of the top five UK universities for research earnings. King's has been
home to 7 Nobel prize winners and this year celebrated the 50th anniversary of
its key role in the elucidation of the structure of DNA. Research is conducted
across a broad range of academic disciplines with particular depth in biomedical
and health sciences.
King's College London is committed to a strategy of creating value from its
intellectual property. The College's technology transfer company, KCL
Enterprises Ltd., has a staff of 45 and handles all aspects of the College's
research grants and contracts administration, knowledge transfer, IP protection
and IP commercialisation activities. Dr Malcolm Sims, a chemist, has led the
company since its inception ten years ago. Over 80 licenses or assignments have
been granted and 15 spin-off companies established, based on the College's
technologies.
Placing
IP2IPO has raised £6.1 million by way of a Placing of 3,825,000 shares at £1.60
per share, valuing the Company at approximately £48 million.
David Norwood, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of IP2IPO, said: "I am
delighted that IP2IPO has entered into partnership with King's College London.
We have been very impressed with the College's strategic outlook and ambitions
to create value from its exceptional intellectual property assets. There is a
meeting of minds between the teams and I am looking forward to embarking on a
partnership that I believe will be of the highest calibre."
Dr Malcolm Sims, Managing Director of KCL Enterprises Ltd, said: "This is an
important partnership for King's College London because it enables us to
accelerate the way in which we can create strong commercial opportunities from
our world class research. It will combine our proven ability to develop and
protect IP with IP2IPO's proven track record in creating businesses and
providing a channel to capital markets to realise value."
For more information, please contact:
The Evolution Group Plc (www.evolution-group.com)
Alex Snow, Chief Executive Officer 020 7071 4348
Andrew Jaques/ Georgina Briscoe 020 7357 9477
(Hogarth Partnership Limited, PR advisers to Evolution)
IP2IPO (www.ip2ipo.com)
David Norwood, Chairman & Chief Executive Officer 020 7071 4348
King's College London (www.kcl.ac.uk)
Dr Malcolm Sims, Managing Director, KCL Enterprises Ltd. 020 7848 6795
Notes to editors
The Evolution Group Plc
The Evolution Group is the holding company of Evolution Beeson Gregory,
Christows and IP2IPO. The Evolution Group is listed on AIM with a current
market capitalization of approximately £110 million.
Evolution Beeson Gregory ("EVBG") aims to be the "leading investment bank to
small and mid cap companies". This is based upon the belief that it has the
strategy and capabilities to achieve this goal, coupled with the fact that the
market opportunity exists for this strategy to be a successful and profitable
one.
The company's capabilities are strong across the primary and secondary equity
market and central to this is the presence of a leading corporate retained
client base in the small and mid cap sector. We service these clients by
providing the full range of corporate finance, research, market making and sales
activities and delivering all of these with a strong client service culture.
Christows is a leading independent firm of stockbrokers and portfolio managers
which, from its foundation in 1991 in Exeter, has always set out to provide a
traditional stockbroking service whilst developing an innovative product
offering. Christows now also operates from London and Bournemouth and has 55
staff across account executive, research, sales and administration staff.
As at 31 December 2002, Christows had a total of £326m client funds under
management, on over three quarters of which it receives a recurring fee based
commission. Christows' strategy for 2003 is one of controlled growth of the
funds under management by organic means through the sales and account executive
teams and by the recruitment of like minded account executives who can attract
new clients to the company.
IP2IPO is a majority owned subsidiary of Evolution Beeson Gregory. IP2IPO's
business is the formation of long-term university partnerships in which it
receives a significant interest in the intellectual property created by its
university partners.
IP2IPO's first such partnership was with the University of Oxford. In return for
an investment of £20 million (which enabled the completion of Oxford's new state
of the art chemistry facilities), IP2IPO has acquired 50% of the university's
shareholding in spin out companies based on intellectual property created at the
chemistry department until 2015.
In March 2002, IP2IPO entered into a second long-term partnership with the
University of Southampton. Under the terms of this partnership, IP2IPO is
committed to working with the University's Centre for Enterprise and Innovation
in the identification and facilitation of spin out companies from across the
University and will invest £5 million in early-stage University spin out
companies over a four year period in return for equity stakes in those
companies. In addition, IP2IPO also receives a 20 per cent stake in Southampton
Asset Management, a company that has been formed to hold the University's equity
stakes in its future spinout companies. The partnership has an initial term of
25 years.
Since August 2001, five spin out companies have been created from the University
of Oxford partnership:
Inhibox Limited - a drug discovery company that harnesses the idle time
computing power of over 2 million PCs world wide.
Pharminox Limited - a drug development company that focuses on platinum based
cancer therapies.
Zyentia Limited - a company based on the pre-eminent protein research of
Professor Chris Dobson, FRS. Zyentia's primary objective is to develop novel
protein drugs using its proprietary "protein folding" technology platform.
Glycoform Limited - a drug delivery company that uses a proprietary carbohydrate
based drug targeting system (LEAPT) developed by 2 Oxford carbohydrate chemists.
VASTox Limited - a company founded by Professor Steve Davies, founder of Oxford
Asymmetry. VASTox is a chemistry services company and has developed a range of
screening technologies for the pharmaceutical industry.
In addition to these Oxford successes, the University of Southampton partnership
has already proved extremely productive and 5 spin outs have been created to
date:
ACTIVEem Limited - is a spin out from Southampton University's School of
Oceanography and utilises novel EM-sounding techniques for the detection of
offshore oil reserves. The company has already generated its first significant
revenues and has successfully raised its second round of finance.
Capsant Neurotechnologies Limited - has been formed to discover new treatments
for disorders of the central nervous system.
Southampton Polypeptides Limited - focuses on novel methods for the synthetic
production of proteins and peptides.
Nanotecture Limited - is a materials science company that has developed a
platform technology based on nanoscale, porous lattices. The company's first
application is energy storage for batteries and supercapacitors.
HepCGen Limited - has been formed to exploit new methods of diagnosis and
treatment for Hepatitis C.
King's College London
King's is one of the oldest and largest colleges of the University of London
with some 12,400 undergraduate students and over 4,700 postgraduates in ten
schools of study. The College had 24 of its subject-areas awarded the highest
rating of 5* and 5 for research quality, demonstrating excellence at an
international level. It is in the top group of five universities for research
earnings and has an annual turnover of over £300 million and research income
from grants and contracts in excess of £90 million (2001-2002).
This information is provided by RNS
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