Dorilton, the private investment firm that acquired UK Formula 1 team Williams Racing in 2020, is pleased to announce the launch of Dorilton Ventures to lead significant minority investments in early to mid-stage technology companies focused on data-centric segments such as enterprise IT infrastructure, data science, and cyber security.
Matthew Savage, Dorilton’s co-founder and Chairman, commented: “Dorilton Ventures brings the strength of our team and our approach – investing capital, time and expertise in long-term partnership with management – into the venture market.”
The Dorilton Ventures team includes investment professionals, data scientists, and IT infrastructure specialists. Dorilton Ventures will focus on delivering Dorilton’s capital, resources, and long-term partnership ‘DNA’ to support early-stage companies and their founders, operating alongside other successful investors to be a force multiplier for exceptional management teams.
Dorilton Ventures will initially target investments globally of $5-10m but may over-allocate to meet the needs of the most transformative businesses in its role as a funding partner throughout a company’s lifecycle.
Matthew Savage added: “Our investments are not time-limited, nor are we subject to the concentration limits faced by many VC funds. We will follow our money so long as the company can deliver attractive returns.”
Dorilton has made multiple venture investments to date, including multi-lingual, geo-enabled social media and web-monitoring platform Babel Street; space-based radio frequency analytics specialist Hawkeye360; healthcare analytics platform Post Acute Analytics; and personalized tissue therapeutics company XenoTherapeutics.
The launch coincides with the group to a single overarching brand, Dorilton, which will preside over standalone strategies, including Dorilton Ventures and the core private equity operation Dorilton Capital, while standing ready to accommodate further initiatives and sector specializations.
Matthew Savage said: “As Dorilton expands its investment strategies beyond our traditional focus on middle-market private equity, we recognized that the Dorilton brand needs to reflect our ambitious future vision. As we launch new initiatives, our shared values of driving results by building relationships and staying humble remain at the core of all of our investment activities.”
The new Dorilton branding, developed by Hydra Strategy alongside a new website www.doriltongroup.com, will make its first major outing with the appearance of the Dorilton Ventures logo on the Williams FW43B car at the 2021 Portuguese Grand Prix, to be held at the Algarve International Circuit April 30th – May 2nd.
James Carnegie-Brown, Hydra partner and strategic brand communications lead, said: "It has been an absolute pleasure working with Dorilton to develop their new and exciting brand identity. Working with the executive team based in New York, we carried out interviews and ran workshops to identify what truly differentiates themselves and why Williams Racing wanted to be part of their group. We devised a new brand strategy as well as creating a new logo, website and supporting collateral. The new identity comprises individual logos for their strategies Dorilton Ventures, Dorilton Capital and Dorilton Motorsports, with additional strategies being added in the not too distant future."