The EIF, a partnership between the EIB and private investors, backs investment funds rather than companies directly. It has never formally suggested that it has cancelled investment in the UK, but technology investors say it effectively turned off the taps when Article 50 was triggered a year ago. The fund’s annual report, published last week, said it had backed just three UK-focused investors, compared with 20 in 2016. The EIF’s overall level of funding across Europe has remained stable at €9.3bn. But the amount committed to UK-focused investors dropped from €708.8m to €61.1m, less than 1pc of its total investment. The figures do not include pan-European funds, some of which are based in the UK. It comes despite technology start-ups in Britain attracting more funding than any other European country by a wide margin. Venture capital investors put £3bn into the UK tech scene in 2017, more than four times the next biggest market, Germany, according to figures from London & Partners.
The European Investment Fund (EIF) reduced its funding of UK technology start-ups by 91% last year, according to London & Partners. That, despite British firms attracting more private funding than any other European country; venture capitalists put 20 times more cash into the UK technology sector than that of Germany. The EIF denied it had formally stopped investing in Britain. Chancellor Philip Hammond said he will give extra support to the British Business Bank if the EIF stops backing UK investors.