Don't invest unless you’re prepared to lose all the money you invest. This is a high-risk investment and you are unlikely to be protected if something goes wrong. Take 2 mins to learn more.
Estimated reading time: 2 min
Due to the potential for losses, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) considers this investment to be high risk.
What are the key risks?
- You could lose all the money you invest
- If the business you invest in fails, you are likely to lose 100% of the money you invested. Most start-up businesses fail.
- You are unlikely to be protected if something goes wrong
- Protection from the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS), in relation to claims against failed regulated firms, does not cover poor investment performance. Try the FSCS investment protection checker here.
- Protection from the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS) does not cover poor investment performance. If you have a complaint against an FCA-regulated firm, FOS may be able to consider it. Learn more about FOS protection here.
- You won’t get your money back quickly
- Even if the business you invest in is successful, it may take several years to get your money back. You are unlikely to be able to sell your investment early.
- The most likely way to get your money back is if the business is bought by another business or lists its shares on an exchange such as the London Stock Exchange. These events are not common.
- If you are investing in a start-up business, you should not expect to get your money back through dividends. Start-up businesses rarely pay these.
- Don’t put all your eggs in one basket
- Putting all your money into a single business or type of investment for example, is risky. Spreading your money across different investments makes you less dependent on any one to do well.
- A good rule of thumb is not to invest more than 10% of your money in high-risk investments.
- The value of your investment can be reduced
- The percentage of the business that you own will decrease if the business issues more shares. This could mean that the value of your investment reduces, depending on how much the business grows. Most start-up businesses issue multiple rounds of shares.
- These new shares could have additional rights that your shares don’t have, such as the right to receive a fixed dividend, which could further reduce your chances of getting a return on your investment.
If you are interested in learning more about how to protect yourself, visit the FCA’s website here.
| Sector: | Technology |
|---|---|
| Target return: | Not specified |
| Minimum investment: | £10,000 |
| Targeted allotment: | 18 to 24 months |
| Next deadline: | 30 Sep 2025 |
Important documents
| Sector: | Technology |
|---|---|
| Target return: | Not specified |
| Minimum investment: | £10,000 |
| Targeted allotment: | 18 to 24 months |
| Next deadline: | 30 Sep 2025 |
Important documents
The Foresight Technology EIS fund invests exclusively in Deep Tech companies. These tend to be intellectual property (IP) rich but often need significant capital and a decade or more to mature – but the possibility of disrupting large, established industries could potentially reward early investors.
Since launch in 2015, the Foresight Technology EIS and its sister VCT have invested over £76 million (£57.4 million through the EIS) in around 40 Deep Tech companies. Examples include Oxford University spinout Refeyn (detailed below) and audio technology business Audioscenic.
In 2022 the EIS fund announced its first two exits: Codeplay for a 16x return (detailed below) and Flusso for a 3.3x return. Overall, the fund has generated exit proceeds of £22.0 million and has a remaining portfolio balance of £56.4 million (June 2025).
- The fund has not set a specific target return – although investee companies should have the potential to deliver 10x return (not guaranteed)
- Targets a minimum of six portfolio companies with a holding period of 4-8 years (not guaranteed)
- The fund aims to deploy funds over 18-24 months from tranche close
- £10,000 minimum investment – you can apply online
- Deadline: 30 September 2025 for next close
Important: The information on this website is for experienced investors. It is not a personal recommendation to invest. If you’re unsure, please seek advice. Investments are for the long term. They are high risk and illiquid and can fall as well as rise in value: you could lose all the money you invest.
The manager
The EIS fund is managed by the 12-strong Foresight Ventures team, part of Foresight Group.
Foresight Group has £13.2 billion of assets under management, of which £1.8 billion in its Private Equity division, including the Foresight VCTs and EIS funds (December 2024).
The team is headed by Andrew Bloxham, who joined Foresight in 2018 and leads the strategy, supported by the wider Foresight Private Equity team of more than 50 investment professionals.
Before your subscription is deployed, the cash will be held by the custodian, Woodside Corporate Services Limited. Once allotted, shares will be held by the depositary, NCM Depositary Services Limited.
Investment strategy
The fund aims to invest in IP-rich companies with innovative and disruptive technologies and the potential to address a large market opportunity.
Companies must demonstrate that their technology offers an “order of magnitude” improvement in terms of performance or cost compared to the status quo. This reflects Foresight’s experience that early-stage companies without a track record need to show they are at least 10 times better, faster, or cheaper to successfully displace incumbents.
Given the long development timeframes inherent in Deep Tech investing, the team tries to avoid highly capital-intensive models. Instead, it prefers companies commercialising and licensing IP, since this should allow them to scale more efficiently.
While the fund is sector agnostic, investments are often aligned with one of the following eight Deep Tech themes:
- Industrial Internet of Things & Sensors
- Autonomous Systems
- Advanced Materials & Nanotechnology
- Next Generation Interfaces
- Factory Automation
- Future of Computing
- Industrial AI
- Scientific Instrumentation
Portfolio
The EIS fund targets a minimum portfolio of six companies with funds fully deployed over 18-24 months (not guaranteed).
Since launch, the fund has invested £57.4 million into 41 companies (March 2025).
Below are portfolio company examples from previous iterations of the fund. They are outlined to give a flavour of the types of companies you might expect but are unlikely to be part of a new investor’s portfolio.
Recent investment
uFraction8 Limited
uFraction8 is a biotech engineering company founded in 2017 to commercialise technology originally developed at the University of Edinburgh’s School of Engineering.
uFraction8 is developing advanced filtration systems to help bio-manufacturers harvest and process microbial cell cultures much more effectively and at a larger scale than traditional methods. For instance, the technology could help separate tiny organisms (like algae or cells for pharmaceuticals) from the liquid in which they are grown.
The technology could help increase production volumes and reduce downtime between batches, currently common in bioprocessing, an affected market expected to be worth $33 billion by 2030.
The EIS fund first invested alongside the Foresight Technology VCT in December 2024, as part of £3.4 million round. The funding is expected to support further technological development, product commercialisation, and expansion of manufacturing capabilities.
Refeyn
Identifying and measuring protein molecules is an integral part of life sciences research, particularly in the development of new medicines. Refeyn is commercialising a disruptive technology that uses light to measure a molecule’s mass (mass photometry). The patented technology was invented at – and spun out from – the University of Oxford and allows users to characterise molecules significantly faster and at a lower cost than existing techniques.
The company has launched several industrial models of its mass photometery instrument and offers additional services from installation to ongoing support.
The EIS Fund first invested £1 million in February 2019 alongside Oxford Sciences Innovation. In 2020 the EIS invested an additional £1.8 million as part of a larger round led by Northpond Ventures, a $1 billion US Life Sciences fund.
The EIS fund's initial investment is currently held at 7.6x cost, with investments across all rounds showing an average valuation of 4.7x cost (March 2025). Past performance is not a guide to the future.
Example of recent exit
Codeplay
Codeplay was founded in 2002 by CEO Andrew Richards to develop tools allowing software to run across multiple pieces of hardware systems.
The company started out working on video games but has since developed tools which are widely used by developers to accelerate Big Data, HPC (High Performance Computing), AI (Artificial Intelligence), and ML (Machine Learning) workloads.
The Foresight Technology EIS first invested in April 2018. Post investment, the fund assisted the company in refining its strategy, making experienced hires and accessing the automotive market – opening up an industry which is traditionally difficult to access for smaller companies.
In June 2022, computer chip giant Intel acquired Codeplay, resulting in a 16x return for the EIS fund. The fund realised gains worth £16.6 million. Past performance is not a guide to the future.
Example of previous failure
Rovco
As is to be expected when investing in smaller companies, not all investments succeed. Rovco is one example.
Established in 2016, Rovco is a deep technology company that used AI and underwater robots to service offshore wind farms.
According to its latest accounts, Rovco made a loss of £8.1 million in 2023, following an £8.7 million loss the previous year.
After an unsuccessful equity raise and a failed attempt to complete an accelerated sale of its business and assets in 2025, the company ceased trading and filed for administration in May 2025, with selected assets and staff subsequently acquired by Rosenxt UK in July.
The EIS fund first invested in the company in July 2019, investing a total of £2.6 million. This has subsequently been written down to zero.
Performance
Since launch in 2016, the EIS fund has achieved two exits, Codeplay (detailed above) and Flusso. These have returned £22.0 million to investors with returns of 16.0x and 3.3x cost respectively. Please note past performance is not a guide to the future.
The chart below shows the average performance of the total subscribed into the funds in each of the last 10 full tax years (or from when the current strategy was adopted if later). The chart is based on the latest valuations provided by the manager, expressed on a £100 invested basis. Please note, individual investor portfolios’ performance will deviate from the average.
Performance per £100 invested in each tax year
Source: Foresight, as at 30 June 2025. Past performance is not a guide to future performance. The chart shows realised returns (where share proceeds have been returned to investors as cash) and unrealised returns (where cash has not yet been returned and the value of the investments is based on the manager’s own valuation methodology). There is no ready market for unlisted shares. The figures shown are net of all fees and do not include any income tax relief or loss relief.
Risks – important
This, like all investments available through Wealth Club, is only for experienced investors happy to make their own investment decisions without advice.
EIS investments are high-risk and should only form part of a balanced portfolio. As must be expected with early-stage investments, some or even all of the companies in the portfolio could fail: the fewer the companies included in the portfolio, the higher the risk of loss if things don’t go to plan. You should not invest money you cannot afford to lose.
There is no ready market for unlisted EIS shares: they are illiquid and hard to sell and value. There will need to be an exit for you to receive a realised return on your investment. Exits are likely to take considerably longer than the three-year minimum EIS holding period; equally, an exit within three years could impact tax relief.
To claim tax relief, you will need EIS3 certificates, normally issued once shares have been allotted. This can take several months: please check the deployment timescales carefully. Tax reliefs depend on the portfolio companies maintaining their EIS-qualifying status. Remember, tax rules can change and benefits depend on circumstances.
Before you invest, please carefully read the Risks and Commitments and the offer documents to ensure you fully understand the risks.
Charges
A summary of the main charges and savings is shown below. Some of these will be payable by the investor, whilst others by the investee companies. The investment may have additional charges and expenses: please see the provider documents, including the Key Information Document, for more details.
| Investor charges | |
|---|---|
| Initial charge | 5.5% |
| Annual management charge | 2% |
| Administration charge | 0.3% |
| Dealing charge | — |
| Performance fee | 20%* |
| Investee company charges | |
| Initial charge | Up to 5% |
| Annual charges | 1% |
The fees and charges above are stated exclusive of VAT, which applies in some cases, as determined by the manager. Please check the VAT position carefully in the provider documents. Any fees and charges payable by the investee companies or the underlying businesses do not directly come out of your investment. However, they will effectively reduce the returns generated by investee companies and therefore impact your investment.
More detail on the charges
When you invest through us, Wealth Club will receive initial commission (3%) and trail commission (0%). These are paid by the provider – there is no additional cost to you.Investor charges may be deducted from the subscription. This will reduce the amount invested and on which tax relief can be claimed.
Any investee company charges are levied on the underlying companies. They will not affect the amount of tax relief available but can still impact investor returns.
The performance fee applies on returns in excess of £1.00 per £1 invested. Whilst not uncommon among EIS funds, this is a low hurdle. Performance fees are calculated on a portfolio basis.
Other charges apply. Please see the provider’s documents, including the Key Information Document, for more details.
Our view
The Foresight Technology EIS aims to offer investors exposure to a portfolio of at least six early-stage Deep Tech companies.
The fund started as a partnership with technical adviser Fortescue (formerly Williams Advanced Engineering) and enjoyed some early successes. It invested alongside some of the world's leading venture capital investors and achieved its first two exits, delivering £22.0 million in proceeds. Please remember past performance is not a guide to the future and that, as with all EIS investments, there will also be failures.
More recently, the relationship with Fortescue has weakened, however the fund has retained its distinct sector focus, which sets it apart from many peers and could make it an interesting addition for seasoned EIS investors – you should form your own view. Please bear in mind Deep Tech companies tend to take longer to mature – potentially requiring greater patience from investors.
This financial promotion has been communicated and approved by Wealth Club Ltd on 18 August 2025
Wealth Club aims to make it easier for experienced investors to find information on – and apply for – investments. You should base your investment decision on the offer documents and ensure you have read and fully understand them before investing. The information on this webpage is a marketing communication. It is not advice or a personal or research recommendation to buy any of the investments mentioned, nor does it include any opinion as to the present or future value or price of these investments. It does not satisfy legal requirements promoting investment research independence and is thus not subject to prohibitions on dealing ahead of its dissemination.