Cushon plumps another £35m investment

Cushon, the workplace pension fintech, has raised £35m through existing investors Augmentum Fintech and AshGrove Capital. Over the past two years Cushon has raised £61m. Cushon is acquiring the Creative auto-enrolment scheme, which marks its third acquisition in two years and will mean the fintech will look after £1.7bn of assets for 400,000 customers.

Vertical Future shoots up with £21m fundraise

London-based “vertical farms” operator Vertical Future has raised £21m with the aim of growing crops indoors at an “industrial scale”. The company has raised the cash from funds and family offices, including a Guernsey-based investment vehicle controlled by Hargreaves Lansdown co-founder Stephen Lansdown. The fundraising values Vertical Future at more than £100m. Vertical Future produces an array of crops, including salads, herbs and some vegetables in vertical stacks up to 50 layers high. It does not use soil and feeds the plants hydroponically or aeroponically with nutrient-rich water.

Stilride revs with £2.5m angel round

Swedish technology and design start-up Stilride has raised £2.5m to produce sustainable electric motorcycles and scooters using a ground-breaking process dubbed “industrial origami”. The manufacturing technique involves robots which can fold single sheets of recyclable steel into intricate, lightweight and durable new structures – significantly reducing the environmental impact of production. This process is being used to create the chassis and body for a fleet of next-generation e-motorcycles, which will go on sale to customers in Europe next year. Angel investors including Gustaf Hagman, Saeid Esmaelizadeh, Sam Bonnier and Andreas Adler joined the round.

ActiveNav software builds £2m Series A+ round

ActiveNav, which develops data privacy and governance software, has closed a £2m Series A+ round. Gresham House Ventures led the fundraise, investing £1.4m alone. The investment builds on a previous £5m investment from Gresham House Ventures’ sister company Mobeus VCTs, which was part of an $11m Series A round for ActiveNav in November 2019. ActiveNav clients include the US Army and Equifax.

Bioscience storage firm Cryoniss closes £500,000 round

Cryoniss, which provides temperature-controlled storage and logistics management services for life sciences, has raised £500,00 from Maven Equity Finance, part of the Northern Powerhouse Investment Fund. The Cheshire-based bioscience start-up will use the money to scale up its operations and sales team.

More Deals of the Week

Deals of the week January 10 to January 14 – a GrowthBusiness roundup