Our Chairman Robert Dighero, with his partners Eileen Burbidge and Stefan Glaenzer has launched an early stage investment firm Passion Capital after working together on business projects at office space White Bear Yard in East London for the past two years.

The £37,5 million funding came from high net-worth individuals and family funds as well as the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills’ wholly owned investment arm Capital for Enterprise. The three raised the money in three months, say they want to target ‘ambitious entrepreneurs who have global ambition’, and have flagged an average investment size of between £150,000 and £200,000 in each business.

Eileen was recently investment director for private early stage VC firm Ambient Sound Investments, founded by the Skype founding engineers.  Robert was most recently chief financial officer for QXL/Tradus, which sold to Naspers in 2008 for £1 billion. Prior to Last.fm, Stefan was co-founder of Ricardo.de, one of the first European online auction and classified sites, sold to QXL. They are quoted on their press release as "We’re passionate about innovation and disruption and building world-leading companies – not just about models”.  From good experience we know that that is them.  Congratulations and good luck!