KERRY SHARP
DIRECTOR
SCOTTISH INVESTMENT BANK & SCOTTISH ENTERPRISE
Kerry Sharp is Director of the Scottish Investment Bank (SIB), the investment arm of Scotland’s main economic development agency, Scottish Enterprise, working in partnership with Highland and Islands Enterprise.
SIB’s role is to grow Scotland’s risk capital and funding markets, ensuring both early stage and established SME’s with growth and exporting potential have adequate access to growth capital to reach their full potential, through working in partnership with private sector investors and funders.
Kerry leads a team responsible for SE’s direct investment activities, commercial loan activities, fund investment, portfolio management, market intelligence and research, and provision of financial readiness support to companies to help them access the most appropriate growth finance.
SIB directly manages three funds – the Scottish Co-Investment Fund, the Scottish Venture Fund and the Energy Investment Fund; is responsible for the delivery of commercial loans through the Scottish Loan Scheme; has invested in two externally managed funds – Epidarex Capital’s Life Sciences Fund and the Scottish Loan Fund (now closed to new investments), which is privately managed by Maven Capital Partners; and has developed a new funding mechanism for scale-up capital in partnership with the European Investment Fund – the Scottish-European Growth Co-Investment Programme.
“At the end of 2018, we launched the Scottish Loan Scheme under Scottish Government’s Scottish Growth Scheme, providing commercial loan funding of £250,000 – £2m (and up to £5m in exceptional circumstances) to growth focused Scottish companies. With loans available for a variety of purposes – including working capital, capex, growth funding and international expansion – the Scheme has received numerous applications demonstrating the need for this type of support in the market.”
“The first cohort of investments through the Scottish-European Growth Co-investment Programme with £6.12m of equity investment delivered deals totalling £16.26m. This Programme aims to increase the scale of available international capital to Scotland’s most ambitious growth companies.
Through understanding financing needs, introducing new investors to the Scottish market, and actively filling the gap in funding availability, SEGCP supports companies to raise the level of investment they needed to help realise their growth ambitions.”
Before joining Scottish Enterprise in 2006, Kerry spent a year as a Property Specialist with Anglo Irish Bank. Previously, she worked for 4 years at 3i, a world-leading venture capital and private equity company, managing a broad portfolio of investments in SMEs with a view to identifying, producing, maintaining and ultimately realising value through successful exits
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