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CEF completed investment in TransGlobal Payment Solutions Limited

The Coalfields Enterprise Fund has provided investment to the company as part of a £1 million funding round to provide development and working capital

CEF completes further investment in CoreRFID Limited

The Coalfields Enterprise Fund, established to support SMEs in the former English coalfield regions, has completed a further investment in CoreRFID Limited

CEF provides further funding to Caspian Learning Limited

The Coalfields Enterprise Fund has completed a further investment in North East-based Caspian Learning Limited as part of a £1.5 million funding round

Case studies

Metalysis Limited

Metalysis is a Cambridge University spinout which holds the rights for the exploitation of a new electrochemical reduction process, allowing a more efficient, cost effective and environmentally-friendly method of extracting pure metals from their oxides.

Founded in 2002, the company relocated to Wath upon Dearne, near Rotherham in late 2004 and chose a site located on top of a former coal mine to build a production facility for the process.

Metalysis is exploiting the FFC Cambridge process which was developed by Prof. Derek Fray and his team at Cambridge University and patented globally in 1998. The novel electrolytic method reduces metal oxide to metal in a molten salt and the process economics indicate that some metals can be produced at a fraction of the price, including tantalum, zirconium, beryllium, silicon, molybdenum, vanadium, tungsten and niobium, offering significant economic and environmental benefits over conventional extraction techniques.

Following a visit to the Fund’s website, Dr Graham Cooley, Chief Executive of the company approached the Fund to join the investment syndicate which comprised of Seven Spires Investments, 3i plc, Generics Asset Management and Cambridge Capital Group, in a £5 million total investment round, that was completed in early March 2005.

Together with national and European grant monies, the funding was used to continue the scale-up and commercialisation of the unique metals extraction process.

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