New venture for Qinetiq

Qinetiq has announced the creation of Qinetiq Ventures, a new technology venture fund to accelerate the development and realisation of seven of its venture investments.

The fund has been launched by Qinetiq and Coller Capital, a global investor in corporate venture assets.

The fund, which will be structured as a Limited Partnership (LP) managed by an independent investment manager, will have initial assets of £40m. Qinetiq and Coller Capital will each contribute up to £20m of follow-on funding to accelerate development of the fund's portfolio companies. Depending on the performance of the fund, Qinetiq will own up to 75 per cent of future economic value.

The new fund's portfolio will comprise partial or wholly owned interests in seven venture assets. Qinetiq's core venture businesses – such as Qinetiq Airport Technologies (with its Tarsier runway debris detection system) and the high-sensitivity GPS business – will remain within Qinetiq’s internal venture structure.

According to Qinetiq, the creation of the new fund will free Qinetiq's existing venture team, led by Hal Kruth (chairman, Qinetiq Ventures) and Mike O'Connor (managing director, Qinetiq Ventures), to bring greater focus on incubating core businesses and developing Qinetiq's pipeline of new commercial ventures.