TIDMIVO
Touchstone Innovations PLC
14 March 2017
RNS REACH
14 March 2017
Touchstone Innovations plc
Innovations supports GBP2.9m funding round in Resolver.co.uk
Touchstone Innovations plc (AIM: IVO or 'the Group',
'Innovations') has participated in a GBP2.9m funding round in
Resolving Limited ('Resolver' or 'the Company') the parent company
of Resolver.co.uk, the independent website dedicated to consumer
rights and complaint resolution.
Innovations has committed GBP1.1 million to the round alongside
co-investor Draper Esprit. As a result of this investment,
Innovations will have an interest of 8.1% in the Company.
Founded in 2014 and based in London, Resolver.co.uk is a website
dedicated to making it easier for consumers to make complaints or
raise issues with brands, companies and organisations. Users can
sign up in seconds via the web site (or its iOS or Android apps) to
create a case and send it off in minutes to the more than 30,000
companies, brands and organisations in the Resolver database. The
Company is also working with the London School of Economics to
analyse data within complaints, assess the severity of these
complaints at scale and attach a severity index to each complaint.
This can be used to rank large volumes of complaints.
The web site is growing at a rate of more than 10%
month-on-month and is now the UK's leading web site for complaint
resolution, with 665,000 registered users and more than 700,000
visits each month. The site now raises an average of 3,000 new
cases on any given day. To date Resolver.co.uk has seen 65% of
cases offered a resolution and has resolved GBP80 million of
issues. Top issues include banking, travel and flight delays,
shopping instore/online, telecoms, utilities and eating out.
The new funding will allow Resolver to expand its team and
invest in new technologies such as artificial intelligence and
machine learning helping to predict the outcome of a customer case.
This will allow the Company to automate key processes to increase
the speed at which cases can be raised and also to help predict the
likelihood of successful resolution.
Jon Edington, Director of Technology Ventures, Touchstone
Innovations, said:
"Resolver is working to transform consumer rights and complaint
resolution by automating the process for the benefit of both
consumers and businesses. The Company has made fantastic progress
since its creation two years ago and we are delighted to back
founder James Walker and his team.
"We are looking forward to working with Resolver to grow its
user base and increase its breadth of offering, not only for
consumers, but also for the thousands of companies in Resolver's
database that use its services to improve customer service and
understand how well their own companies and organisations are
performing."
Enquiries:
Touchstone Innovations plc 020 3053 8834
Russell Cummings, Chief Executive
Officer
Jon Davies, Director of Communications
Instinctif Partners 020 7457 2020
Adrian Duffield/Melanie Toyne-Sewell/Chantal
Woolcock
J.P. Morgan Cazenove (Nominated
Adviser) 020 7742 4000
Michael Wentworth-Stanley/Alec
Pratt
RBC Capital Markets 020 7653 4000
Darrell Uden/Marcus Jackson/Laura
White
About Touchstone Innovations - www.touchstoneinnovations.com
Touchstone Innovations plc (formerly Imperial Innovations Group
plc or just "Innovations") creates, builds and invests in
pioneering technology companies and licensing opportunities
developed from outstanding scientific research from the 'Golden
Triangle', the geographical region broadly bounded by London,
Cambridge and Oxford.
This area has an unrivalled cluster of outstanding academic
research and technology businesses, and is home to four of the
world's top 10 universities, as well as leading research
institutions, the cream of the UK's science and technology
businesses and many of its leading investors.
Innovations supports scientists and entrepreneurs in the
commercialisation of their ideas, through the licensing of
intellectual property, by leading the formation of new companies,
by recruiting high-calibre management teams and by providing
investment and encouraging co-investment. Innovations remains an
active investor over the life of its portfolio companies, with the
majority of Innovations' investment going into businesses in which
it is already a shareholder.
Since becoming a public company in 2006, Innovations has raised
more than GBP440 million of equity from investors, which has
enabled it to invest in some of the most exciting spin-outs to come
out of UK academic research. In addition, the Group has agreed
GBP80.0 million in loan facilities from the European Investment
Bank (EIB).
Between Innovations' admission to AIM (August 2006) and 31 July
2016, Innovations has invested a total of GBP306.7 million across
its portfolio companies, which have raised collectively investment
of GBP1.5 billion.
About Resolver - www.resolver.co.uk
Resolver's free and independent website and iOS/Android apps
enable people to get their complaints heard quickly and easily and
resolved successfully. After entering details of issues into the
impartial platform, users are given templated emails created
automatically with all their relevant details. These are then sent
through the Resolver system to the right department/s at any of
more than 30,000 brands, companies and organisations. Complaints
can then be escalated throughout the hierarchy all the way to the
Ombudsman Services or appropriate regulators.
Each day, an average of 1500 new cases are raised through
Resolver.co.uk. The website receives more than 600,000 visits each
month and offers up-to-date advice and tips at the start of the
process to inform users of their consumer rights.
The company was launched in September 2014 by James Walker
following an awful complaints experience relating to a boiler
repair at his home. Based in Borough, south London, in 2015,
Resolver won business SME award The Pitch. Resolver are proud
members of AdviceUK, TrustMark, Trading Standards Institute and Buy
with Confidence and work in consultation with regulators,
government departments, Ombudsmen and consumer rights
organisations.
This information is provided by RNS
The company news service from the London Stock Exchange
END
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