Its EIS 14 fund was made available to investors on 2 July, with company chairman Susan McDonald saying: “In over a decade of managing EIS funds we’ve never seen so much investor interest, nor have we encountered so many good quality investment opportunities, or been offered such attractive terms.”
The new EIS is a generalist fund seeking to raise £20m, the closing date for which is 4 October 2012. The company has not committed any of the funds yet but is already doing the due diligence on a number of small, unlisted UK companies it sees as investment opportunities.
It is not limited by set sector criteria and, following its existing strategy, the types of company will be similar to previous EIS funds that include catering firms, clinical research companies, manufacturers of sustainable building materials and so on.
McDonald added: “In the past couple of years the government has increased tax relief, allowed investors to put more money into EIS funds and changed the rules to broaden the investible universe.”