Newcastle University spinout, Microbritt, has raised £400,000 to scale its production capacity. The investment will also enable the company to expand their sales and engineering team and invest in R&D.
The investment round was led by the North East Innovation Fund supported by the European Regional Development Fund and managed by Northstar Ventures, alongside Business Investors Group and angels.
Microbritt – from strength to strength
Microbritt is a bespoke high-precision micromanufacturing service with unique capabilities in manufacturing products from brittle materials such as glass, silicon, polymers and ceramics.
The business spun out from Newcastle University in 2021. They have developed a patented process for the production of high value prototypes and complex products created from brittle materials.
The technology has applications across several sectors, including semiconductors, healthcare, photonics and defence.
They are also working with key partners on an Innovate UK funded project. The project called PathoScout explores the use of microfluidics to monitor and treat agricultural crop diseases.
“A very exciting time for the company”
Carl Dale, CEO of Microbritt, said:
‘It’s amazing to see how the company has gone from strength to strength over the past few years. We started as a small spinout but we’re now scaling fast. This has been due to the fact, as a manufacturing service, we help to solve our customers’ problems and allow them to overcome their technical hurdles to develop their own products. This allowed us to gain customer traction fast and generate revenues within one month of operating.
“This round of investment will help us to develop a sales team to drive sales to a worldwide audience, alongside scaling our engineering capacity. This is a very exciting time for the company.”
“A unique high-value process”
Tom O’Neill, Investment Manager at Northstar Ventures, said:
“We are pleased to support Microbritt with further funding, which will enable them to scale up production capacity and invest in the technology and team. They have developed a unique, high-value process with applications across many large and growing sectors and we look forward to seeing the business continue to grow in the next stage of their journey.”
Northern Accelerator support
Microbritt has been supported by Northern Accelerator, with the team being awarded pre-incorporation funding prior to spinout, and then new spinout growth support. Additionally, CEO Carl Dale attended Northern Accelerator’s Future Founders course and the management team was strengthened with Executives into Business support.