The New Brunswick Innovation Foundation released its 2016-17 annual report on Wednesday, revealing an active year, in which it invested in 29 different companies.
The report on the innovation agency’s operations in the 12 months to March 31, 2017, reveals that NBIF’s two funds invested a total of $4.6 million in the 29 companies. In the 2016 fiscal year, NBIF had invested a total of $3.8 million in 22 companies.
NBIF makes its investments through two funds – the Venture Capital Fund, which invests up to $1 million per round, and the Startup Investment Fund, whose maximum investment in one round is $200,000.
The largest investment last year was in Fredericton-based Smart Skin Technologies, which has developed pressure-sensitive linings to help detect jams in large-scale bottling operations. It received $497,884.
In his address to stakeholders, CEO Calvin Milbury noted that the venture capital investments make up only part of the mandate for NBIF, which also provides research vouchers to help companies work with university researchers.
“Last year, we invested $12.1 million into New Brunswick entrepreneurs and researchers,” said Milbury. “For every dollar we invested, an additional $4.24 was leveraged from other capital sources. That’s a $63.4 million impact.”
The 2017 fiscal year included the biennial Breakthru competition, in which NBIF provided $300,000 in funding to four new startups. The total prize pot, fincluding funds and services from other sources, was more than $1 million.
The following are the investments in the 2016-17 fiscal year:
Venture Capital Fund
Smart Skin $497,884
Flixel $400,000
Resson $308,981
Fundmetric $300,000
Precision Plasma $250,000
RtTech $250,000
Sorcimed $250,000
Populus Global $200,000
Cyberpsyc $200,000
Knowcharge $175,000
Eigen $100,000
Envenio $100,000
Itavio $100,000
Porpoise $100,000
Sentrant $93,126
Inversa $75,000
Xiplinx $60,000
Agora $20,000
Total $3.48 million
Leveraging $24.2 million
Startup Investment Fund
Kognitiv Spark $200,000
Repable $150,000
Jaza Energy $100,000
Rise Home Design $100,000
Patchell Brook $100,000
Black Arcs $100,000
Chinova Bioworks $100,000
Newpy* $100,000
Pfera* $100,000
Soma Detect* $50,000
WenTech* $50,000
Total $1.15 million
Leveraging $2.7 million
* Awarded as part of the Breakthru competition.
The annual report also notes that the organization now has 45 companies in its portfolio, and lists the lifetime investment in each. Here are the top five in terms of investment levels:
RtTech Software $1,250,000
Inversa Systems $1,075,381
SmartSkin Tech $1,001,454
Populus Global $971,600
Gemba $750,000
Disclosure: NBIF is a client of Entrevestor.
