HBAN angels to invest €10m in sustainability start-ups

Aims to recruit investors at its all-island online conference

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(L-R) Faye Walsh Drouillard and Julian Seymour, HBAN

27 January 2022

Halo Business Angel Network (HBAN) plans to increase funding for socially conscious start-ups on the island of Ireland with the launch of its Impact Syndicate. HBAN is the all-island organisation responsible for the promotion of business angel investment, and a joint initiative of Enterprise Ireland, InterTradeIreland and Invest Northern Ireland,

Members of HBAN’s Impact Syndicate will collectively invest €10 million in environmental, social, and governance (ESG) start-ups on the island of Ireland over the next three years. The syndicate will consider pitches from start-ups focusing on climate, agri-tech and food supply chain, energy, blue economy, health and cleantech.

Set to launch at its online All-Island Conference on 2 February 2022, the syndicate will be co-chaired by Faye Walsh Drouillard, the first female chair of a HBAN syndicate, and Mark Peters. Walsh Drouillard is an impact investor and along with Peters, is a co-founder of WakeUp Capital.

Impact investing allows investors to drive positive and measurable social and environmental change alongside financial returns. In 2020, the global market reached up to $2.1 trillion in assets under management.

“Investors and entrepreneurs alike want to make a meaningful impact,” said Julian Seymour, syndicates manager, HBAN. “The global focus on ESG has created a market with almost boundless opportunities for growth and we want to help Irish businesses to be a part of that story.

“HBAN’s Impact Syndicate will help to drive ground-breaking ESG innovation across the island of Ireland by providing the funding and knowledge that socially-aware start-ups need to scale. This will be supported by our two chairs who have extensive experience in impact investing, and who have significantly contributed to the growth of impact investing here.”

“Impact investing provides exciting financial potential for investors, while also enabling them to make a difference in the community and even the planet,” said Faye Walsh Drouillard, co-chair of HBAN impact syndicate. “I am passionate about supporting entrepreneurs to drive real social and environmental change, and impact investing is central to this. It also attracts a more diverse investor profile, which in turn facilitates investment in a more diverse range of companies. It is this diversity that will help us to solve real-world problems and build a better future for everyone.”

HBAN’s all-day event will focus on impact investing and demystifying angel investment, which it hopes will encourage existing and first-time angel investors to join the network and consider its Impact Syndicate.

Speakers at the conference will include Marcia Dawood, chair of the Angel Capital Association in the US; serial entrepreneur Norman Crowley, founder of Crowley Carbon; and Loretta McCarthy, whose investor consortium Golden Seeds backs early-stage female-led businesses in the US.

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