Serial entrepreneur and investor, Hermann Hauser, has called for the advent of more European growth funds dedicated to technology that are prepared to write mega cheques to scale innovative businesses.

Dr Hauser raised what were then record amounts for Cambridge at Acorn Computers in the late 70s and early 80s. He has watched the Science & Technology cluster in Cambridge mushroom over the last two decades but is now calling for more of the same.

Dr Hauser, whose quoted Acorn business spawned superchip world-leader Arm, was talking to Business Weekly after major rounds for cyber security specialist Darktrace and medical innovator Owlstone in the last few days.

He said: “This is absolutely brilliant. We need a lot more of these deals in Europe and it is great to see the beginning of it in Cambridge.

“The lack of $50m to $100m rounds in Europe is the main drawback of the hi-tech scene. We need more European tech growth funds which can write $50m to $100m cheques to keep the momentum going.”

Dr Hauser co-founded Amadeus Capital Partners in 1997 with Anne Glover. His successes at Amadeus include CSR plc; Entropic Research Laboratory, acquired by Microsoft in 1999; Solexa, acquired by Illumina in 2007 and Icera, acquired by Nvidia in 2011.

He has founded or co-founded companies in a wide range of technology sectors including Acorn Computers, Active Book Company, Virata, Net Products, NetChannel and Cambridge Network. He was a founder director of IQ (Bio), IXI Limited, Vocalis, SynGenix, Advanced Displays Limited (acquired by Cambridge Display Technology), Electronic Share Information Limited, E*Trade UK and has supported many other start-ups.

In September 2018, Amadeus Capital Partners lead a $5m funding round in London-based SLAMcore which is developing spatial artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms for robots and drones. 

Also last month, one of Amadeus’ portfolio companies – machine learning innovator Ravelin – raised £8m to help secure online commerce from the growing threat of fraud.