Welcome to the latest edition of the DIGIT Deal Roundup column, featuring some of the top investment and acquisition news stories from May, 2023.

Scotland’s digital technology sector saw a number of notable deals across the month, including significant raises from Glasgow’s IbisVision, and acquisition from Kin + Carta.

Funding and Investments

Cyber Scotland Connect/ ScotlandIS

Cyber Scotland Connect has received financial sponsorship through ScotlandIS, Cyber Scotland Partnership in partnership with the Scottish Government.

This sponsorship will support Cyber Scotland Connect in running in-person events throughout 2023 and into 2024.

Read more here.

Hutton Institute

Scottish scientists at the James Hutton Institute have won £360,000 in funding to commercialise a technology that unlocks how plants and animals modify their genes when faced with disease or environmental change.

Use of the technology offers major advances in medical diagnosis, such as identifying cancers and the development of new crops, by allowing scientists to identify changes in gene activity related to diseases like cancer or reactions too high temperatures or drought.

Read more here.

IbisVision

Glasgow-based tech firm IbisVision has raised £4.5 million in growth funding as it seeks to launch into the US healthcare market to sell its remote eye test platform.

IbisVision’s refractive technology allows optometrists to run standard eye tests over the internet, and enables entire optical prescriptions to be conducted remotely.

Read more here.

The Hartree Centre

The Hartree Centre — the promoter of digital innovation in the UK — has awarded £4.5 million to three universities to become regional digital transformation hubs for small- and medium-sized businesses (SMEs).

Cardiff University, Ulster University, and Newcastle University have each been awarded a share of the funding as part of an innovation programme being undertaken by the Centre in partnership with IBM.

Read more here.

Scottish Tech Army

To help scale its Tech for Good Alliance initiative, the Scottish Tech Army has been awarded funding support of up to £350,000 over a two-year period from the National Lottery Community Fund.

The award, which is made possible by National Lottery players, provides match funding of subscriptions from companies that sign up as participating members of the Tech for Good Alliance.

Read more here.

Advanced Propulsion Centre

£77 million in new joint government and industry funding will assist the further development of the UK’s zero-emission vehicle industry, in a push to posture the UK as a leader in the sector.

The funding was awarded through the Advanced Propulsion Centre (APC) Collaborative Research and Development programme, in support of ambitions to build an end-to-end supply chain for zero-emission vehicles. £38.4m was provided by the UK Government and a further £38.7 was invested by players in the automotive industry.

Read more here.

Hospital at Home

Hospital at Home, a programme which delivers virtual hospital care direct to people’s homes, has been allocated a further £3.6m to support more than 150 extra virtual beds.

The programme aims to provide a safe, patient-centered alternative to hospital admission, providing better outcomes for the patient who can receive treatment in the safety and comfort of their own home, as well as reducing pressure on hospital sites.

Read more here.

National Semiconductor Strategy

With the new National Semiconductor Strategy, the UK government plans to invest up to £1bn in the next decade — with £200 million being invested over 2023-2025 — to help bolster the UK’s skills in semiconductor research, design, and compound semiconductor creation.

The government says that building on these domestic strengths can subsequently help to safeguard supply chains, protect the UK against security risks, and stimulate the growth of the UK’s semiconductor sector.

Read more here.

Snugg

Snugg, the online service dedicated to making energy-efficient homes accessible to everyone, has announced that it’s received a significant grant from the Green Home Finance Accelerator (GHFA) — a UK Government initiative funded through the Net Zero Innovation Portfolio (NZIP) — designed to promote the development of green finance products.

This funding will be utilised to develop a ‘Green Home Hub’ (GHH) that will help finance providers better understand the needs of customers who are considering investing in home energy improvements, such as solar panels and heat pumps, and offer more suitable products.

Read more here.

Space Clusters and Infrastructure Fund

Through the government’s UK Space Agency arm, the newly-created Space Clusters and Infrastructure Fund (SCIF) will award match funding to approximately 5-10 projects from UK organisations, receiving up to £10 million each.

Specifically, the funding is available to industry and academia who are able to deliver projects to procure, build, or upgrade R&D facilities and equipment that will bring “high potential, high value” space technologies to market.

Read more here.

The Department for Education

The Department for Education (DfE) today released a £165 million local skills improvement fund aimed at upskilling workers and improving facilities to meet employment needs.

Applicants are invited to access the funding to address what the DfE is calling “skills black holes”. Successful applicants will be able to revamp facilities, provide equipment, and offer courses in subjects critical to today’s economy such as green construction, carbon capture, and cyber security.

Read more here.

The Data Lab

The Data Lab and the Williams Quarriers Scottish Epilepsy Centre have funded research by Glasgow Caledonian University (GCU) into a new AI software solution that could transform the diagnosis and treatment of epilepsy.

Led by Professor Hadi Larijani, Director of GCU’s SMART Technology Research Centre, the researchers created software that could save clinical specialists valuable time in diagnosing patients who are believed to suffer from epilepsy, and give clinicians an all-important warning ahead of an epileptic seizure.

Read more here.

Deals and Acquisitions

Kin + Carta

TDigital transformation consultancy Kin + Carta has acquired the data service provider Forecast Data Services in a bid to strengthen the firm’s enterprise data and artificial intelligence (AI) services.

The Forecast acquisition doubles Kin + Carta’s European data practice to more than 100 expert data specialists, accelerating its data and AI strategy as rising demand for AI, advanced predictive data solutions and data science highlight the importance of data transformation on enterprise technology roadmaps.

Read more here.