News | CFPro Ventures Ltd

Corporate Venturing in Oil & Gas: a summary

"Corporate venture investments by oil and gas companies hit record highs in 2016 and 2017, after a slight dip following the 2014 crash in oil prices." - so says CB Insights after extensive analysis of investment activity of a selection of the largest and most active companies across the Oil & Gas value chain. In fact, such is the trend in Corporate Venturing within the Oil & Gas sector that not only have they taken an equity stake in about half of all oil and gas start-ups that have raised funding, but they have also committed hundreds of millions of dollars to petroleum [...]

Katy Roberts2018-09-19T12:36:10+00:00September 25th, 2018|News|Comments Off

Diving into Innovation at NCE Tech Fest

Today kicks off a stalwart event in the Innovations and Tech Industry. CFPro Ventures has been invited to take a seat on the judging panel at this year's NCE Tech Fest - a Festival of Innovation that aims to showcase and celebrate the innovations and technologies that will drive the industry forward. Having already met some of the candidates taking part in today's event, we have already been astounded at the high calibre of entrepreneurship and capability being displayed throughout. Digital Improvement of Productivity But there's one thing that stands out from today's event: most of what we've seen [...]

Katy Roberts2018-09-19T10:17:44+00:00September 19th, 2018|Corporate Venturing, News, SME Growth|Comments Off

Meet Ian: A decisive, results-driven individual with firm roots in the private, manufacturing, sales & services sectors.

With over 35 years of commercial and governance experience across many functional areas, along with experience of merger integration and divestment, Ian brings a decisive, results-driven approach heralded firmly within the private, manufacturing, product sales and service sectors working with advanced technology, digital and heavy engineering products. With a proven track record of delivering stakeholder value, Ian has led teams to deliver superior outcomes and deploys a value-driven, ethical approach, with broad functional, governance and leadership skills across many functional areas. Ian thrives in challenging environments and has rich, diverse international experience in leading-edge technology industry. With governance experience across sectors, he has [...]

Katy Roberts2018-09-13T09:38:17+00:00September 13th, 2018|News, Partner Profiles|Comments Off

7 reasons why your weakest link is failing to financially plan

We're not going to tell you that failing to plan, is planning to fail. We're also not going to tell you that a goal without a plan, is just a wish. We're also not going to tell you that making sense of cents is your first step towards growth. We're also not going to scare you with the facts that, on average, 40% of new businesses actually see a profit, 30% break even and the rest continually lose money. We're not going to tell you all that, because you probably already know all of this. But what we are going [...]

Katy Roberts2018-09-11T13:24:49+00:00September 11th, 2018|News|Comments Off

Help with Series B business funding: What to know.

It wouldn't take a lot for you to find articles about institutions, individuals and initiatives that are promoting the concept of "business funding". But take a few extra minutes to sort through the parade of promotional funding help, and you'll soon identify a couple of things that make the search for business funding slightly less exciting. So, to help you along your business growth journey, we thought we'd share a few home truths. Barrage of Help: But at a price Financing a business is viewed by many people starting out on their own business journey, as a necessity for [...]

Katy Roberts2018-09-06T10:49:28+00:00September 6th, 2018|News, SME Growth|Comments Off

What is Corporate Venturing: The history to help you get started

What is Corporate Venturing? Corporate venturing, also known as corporate venture capital, is the practice of directly investing corporate funds into external start-up or early stage companies. This is usually done by large companies who wish to invest in new, innovative revenue streams, by taking equity stakes. The investing company may also provide other support, such as management and marketing expertise, strategic direction, and/or a line of credit. Is Corporate Venturing something new? Corporate Venturing is not new. It is generally accepted that Pierre S. Du Pont, then president of chemical and plastics manufacturer DuPont, started it in 1914. [...]

Hardy Giesler2018-09-05T14:50:59+00:00September 5th, 2018|Corporate Venturing, News|Comments Off

If your digital isn’t working, is your analogue good enough?

Although sparking a rather comical look at digital disruption, the news this week of Gatwick Airport's digital flight display systems going following an IT failure, and having to resort to the good old white board and marker, left more than just a smile on our faces. In a world that is saturated with articles about digital disruption, digital change and digital readiness, sometimes things simply go wrong - as in the case with Gatwick Airport and their reliance on a service provider to deliver a critical part of their operational infrastructure. And when things go wrong, and digital goes down, [...]

Katy Roberts2018-08-22T13:28:47+00:00August 22nd, 2018|News, SME Growth|Comments Off

The real truth behind Innovation within UK business

One could probably rebuild an entire life-size replica of Stonehenge using all the scholarly articles and books on Leadership and Management styles, 7-fold over - and we are not about to repeat what many knowledgeable, insightful business scholars have said before. However, in an evolving world - where innovation, collaboration and sustainability is a topic so familiar and as common as the salt in our grinders, the milk in our coffee and the water in our kettles, we still we see organisations battling not with understanding what needs to be done, but rather identifying the way, for them, to get [...]

Katy Roberts2018-08-16T09:07:19+00:00August 16th, 2018|News, SME Growth|Comments Off

Why the UK Tech industry is poised for growth, and why foreign investors want a piece of the (tech) pie.

Our sister company, CFPro, today published the results of a Deloitte Survey of UK CFOs discussing their concerns, areas of focus and how they intend to prepare for continuing economic instability. Although the consensus is that UK CFOs are concerned about the long-term effects of Brexit, in the short-term, they're focussing on managing the growing level of skills shortages and managing cash flow within their organisations while at the same time, keeping an eye on innovations that continue to drive their business towards growth. On the home front, businesses push forward to sustain their bottom line through a period of [...]

Katy Roberts2018-08-09T14:17:54+00:00August 9th, 2018|Corporate Venturing, News, SME Growth|Comments Off

Are you happy to be just another statistic?

The news broke this week of yet another retail giant being exposed to ceaseless cyber-attacks resulting in 10m of their customers' personal data being compromised. According to the news story, "Dixons Carphone has admitted a huge data breach involving 5.9 million payment cards and 1.2 million personal data records." - BBC, 31 July 2018. What's probably worse is the fact that this hacking attempt started in July 2017 - one year ago. It still astounds us how so many organisations are ill-prepared for the digital war going on under our very noses. And yet, even larger organisations, who may appear [...]

Katy Roberts2018-08-01T16:04:57+00:00August 1st, 2018|News, SME Growth|Comments Off