Oxford's venture ecosystem

Between 2022 and 2024, I was an Investment Director at the Oxford Seed Fund and then Associate Fellow at Said Business School (to help scale the fund after our £2.5m fundraise). In that time, we saw ~350 pitch decks from Oxford students, staff and alumni; I spoke to maybe 100 founders; worked with (brilliant!) students sourcing/diligencing deals; and the team committed 17 seed-stage investments. Disclaimer: All comments are my own — in the spirit of being helpful to entrepreneurs at Oxford, VCs looking to back Oxford founders, and other stakeholders interested in supporting Oxford’s entrepreneurship ecosystem.

(1) If you’re an entreprecurious Oxford student, there are great resources scattered across the university. This could mean you haven’t yet founded a venture, but you’re thinking about launching something, considering turning an invention into a venture, or just ideating around a problem space — there are programs that could support you:

• Building a Business @ the Entrepreneurship Center — a 5 week free program will give you the opportunity to understand and learn more about what it takes to run your own business.

• Ideas 2 Impact @ the Entrepreneurship Center — an innovation and enterprise skills initiative convened at Saïd Business School, in collaboration with the Entrepreneurship Centre and the University of Oxford sciences divisions. The programme is open to postdoctoral researchers in the Medical Sciences, and Mathematical, Physical and Life Sciences divisions and applicants from other divisions on a case-by-case basis.

• Oxford Venture Builder @ the Entrepreneurship Center — a 5 week free programme designed to provide you or your team with the tools, knowledge and experience you need to research the market, test the viability of your ideas and develop your products and services. Top-performing teams will have the opportunity to compete for a share of a cash grant. Supported by EnSpire.

• Oxford’s Business and Intellectual Property Centre @ Westgate. There to help Oxfordshire’s entrepreneurs access resources.

(2) If you’re a startup founder, there are angels and seed-stage venture capital investors looking to back you. This means you’ve moved beyond the ‘ideation stage’, you’ve picked a problem space, you’ve got a pitch deck and maybe a co-founder or two, you have firmed up an idea of your solution, and you’ve registered your business. You might have revenue, you might not. This might still just be an idea, or it might be validated with customers and early traction. But one thing you’re sure of is that you’re looking for capital. The Oxford ecosystem has some doors you may want to knock on:

• Oxford Seed Fund — a £2.5m student-managed venture fund, we invest between £20,000 to £100,000 in the top Oxford-affiliated startups (typically not spinouts as OSE is our LP — we try not to overlap as that would miss the point). In 2023–24 we committed ~14 investments across climate tech, biotech/medtech, AI-enabled tools, B2B SaaS, fintech, and DeFi.

• Oxford Science Enterprises — investing in spinouts at pre-seed and seed stage, from £50k to £25m tickets, including first check in and follow-on financing. Spinouts first port of call for fundraising.

• OUI Incubator — free and aimed at members and ex-members of the University of Oxford wanting to start or grow entrepreneur-driven ventures that are not University spinouts. Offering mentoring, funding support, an accelerator program, and access to facilities.

• All Innovate — the University of Oxford’s idea competition aiming to encourage students and staff at the University of Oxford to develop an entrepreneurial skill set and generate entrepreneurial ideas, regardless of discipline, level of study or entrepreneurial experience. Once a year, pitch to a panel, grant prize.

• Oxford Innovation Finance’s angel network (OION). NB: OION charge a presentation fee (£395 + VAT) and a success fee (5% of funds raised through the network).

• Oxford Angel Fund — the largest group of Oxford-graduate investors with the common interest of investing in Oxford educated entrepreneurs. Independent but collaborates with Oxford.

(3) Startup founders are not just looking for capital: they also need peer networks, resources and supports. If that’s you, Oxford also has you covered.

• OXVC is a student society giving students a way to learn about VC and also engage with Oxford’s startup ecosystem. Oxford Entrepreneurs is Europe’s largest entrepreneurship society, hosting events.

• ZERO Founders Network is an entrepreneurial hub for climate-tech founders (just launched — loving what Marcel and the team are building. OX1 a student-managed generalist incubator, Nucleate is a student-managed biotech activator’. Planet Positive Lab is a 10-week accelerator for climate and sustainability ventures, backed by Founders Factory and Planet Fund. Also worth checking out Founders & Funders for connecting the ecosystem.

• Taylor Wessing (not networking, but knowledge/support) is a law firm based at Grassroots on Woodstock Road. They offer free walk-in clinics for startup founders bi-monthly on Wednesdays. James & Nicola are super friendly and helpful.

• There are several student societies supporting entrepreneurship in specific areas of tech, including OXAI andOxford Blockchain Society.

• OSEF is the annual entrepreneurship conference held at the business school. EnSpire plugs everything in together with information and resources for entrepreneurs.

(4) Female entrepreneurs, globally, receive less funding than their male counterparts: only 2% of all VC funding goes to women-led startups. Aside from being completely ridiculous, this misses out on backing brilliant founders who can grow massive businesses. Oxford has some great programs focused on supporting women in entrepreneurship.

• Wonder Women (an initiative led by EnSpire) features female entrepreneurs from within Oxford’s startup ecosystem.

• IDEA (Increasing Diversity in Enterprising Activities) is a set of long term and sustainable actions and interventions aimed at addressing inequalities in entrepreneurship. By providing resources and opportunities to underrepresented groups, IDEA promotes a more equitable and dynamic entrepreneurial ecosystem.

• Oxford Women in Business Society (OxWib) runs workshops, networking events, socials, and mentorship connects for women in Oxford interested in entrepreneurship.

• Dr Mairi Gibbs, Chief Operating Officer at Oxford University Innovation, explores what can be done to increase the number of women founding companies as Oxonians.

• Enterprising Women (under the Mathematical, Physics, and Life Science Division) encourages, inspires and supports the participation of women STEM researchers in innovation and entrepreneurship through a variety of events and programmes.

(5) Oxford’s got a lot to offer. And because of that, there are a lot of external parties paying attention. Outside of the support and funding available inside Oxford’s ecosystem, there are venture capital funds and accelerators fishing in Oxford for startups and founders. In no particular order, I’ve jotted down below a list of VCs or accelerators that I’ve seen backing founders from Oxford in recent years: Oxford Capital, Creator Fund, Techstars, Antler, Entrepreneur First, Founders Factory, Carbon 13, Blackbird VC, Zinc, LocalGlobe, Seedstars, Tiny VC, Ada Ventures, Counteract VC.

6) Finally, founders need a place to mingle.

If you’re a founder, an operator, a VC or an angel, or just generally interested in entrepreneurship — I recommend the Oxford Saïd Entrepreneurship Forum (OSEF) — a one-day conference, held annually at the business school. Last year’s OSEF had a fireside chat with Lars Rasmussen, co-founder of Google Maps; keynotes from Anne Boden MBE, founder of Starling Bank, Nick Jenkins, founder of Moonpig, and Ross Richardson, Chief Design Officer at SharkNinjasolid. The keynotes were excellent — and the panels really quite good also 🙂

Alongside the speakers, the best thing about OSEF is the attendees — I’m a big believer that mingling ‘cross-pollination’ leads to innovation and quality ventures. OSEF provides an opportunity to meet people from across the ecosystem and from outside of Oxford.