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Pentech Ventures completes first investment

25 October 2001

Pentech Ventures, an early stage technology fund launched in July 2001, announced today that it has completed its first deal with an investment in Applied Generics Ltd., a provider of innovative telematics solutions to the mobile telecommunications industry.

Pentech is the sole institutional investor in the company’s £800,000 first round fund raising and has committed equity totalling £650,000, with the remainder of the capital being provided by the existing shareholders. The additional funding will primarily be used to accelerate product development and to increase the company’s sales and marketing capability.

Founded in November 1999 with private funding, Applied Generics has developed a software solution, RoDIN24TM, which enables mobile network operators to derive real time road traffic information by monitoring the movement of mobile telephones within their own network. This information can then be delivered to its customers and third parties in a variety of formats including interactive voice, WAP and Internet.

Applied Generics’ technology is a major advance on existing competing solutions. Their core algorithms passively monitor network radio information to compute location and road speed of individual users, which is then aggregated to produce traffic information. The system does not require installation of any additional roadside sensor infrastructure, leading to a faster roll-out of the technology, over a wider geographic area, and at lower cost. Furthermore, it does not impact on the network performance, meeting a key operational need.

In addition, as each network operator will "own" the content produced by its own RoDIN24 system and will be able to sell the service to both subscribers and third parties, offering increased opportunities for revenue growth. Following on from the successful drive test trials of earlier, this year the RoDIN24 system is currently undergoing live trial with a leading European mobile network operator.

David Armour of Pentech Ventures commented:

"I am delighted that Pentech’s first investment is in such a high quality business with an exceptionally talented management team. In the two years since it was founded, the company has developed a strong product offering and has established strategic relationships with several large industry partners. We believe there is a growing market opportunity for Applied Generics technology as network operators seek to improve their ability to provide accurate real time traffic information to its customers and we look forward to working with the management team to grow the business."