Project Ventures, the solo general partner firm founded by Shahryar Barati, has reached a £1.2 million first close on its maiden venture fund. The vehicle will write pre-seed and seed cheques into artificial intelligence and deep technology companies emerging from the Imperial College London ecosystem. The announcement provides an early look at how university-anchored investment strategies are being structured in the UK's emerging manager market.
A Narrow Strategy Built Around One University
The fund's strategy is deliberately focused on the intersection of deep tech and artificial intelligence. It backs founders from the Imperial College London community and its connected networks who are applying frontier science and engineering to hardware and software with defensible intellectual property. These are pre-seed and seed stage companies, a stage where university spinouts often struggle to assemble a first institutional round.
Small First Close Reflects Solo GP Realities
A £1.2 million first close is small in absolute terms and says more about the structure of Britain's emerging manager market than about the size of the opportunity. Solo GP funds have multiplied in the United Kingdom over the past two years, but first-time managers without an institutional anchor generally close in tranches. They often deploy from an initial pool while continuing to raise, and Project Ventures has not disclosed its total fund target, cheque size or limited partner base.
Access at the Point of Ownership
Imperial College is one of the UK's most prolific generators of science and engineering spinouts, making the university-adjacent angle particularly relevant for cap tables. Equity in these companies is contested at formation because the technology transfer office, founding academics and early angels all take positions before institutional investors arrive. A fund built explicitly around one university's pipeline is buying proximity to that deal flow and access at the point where ownership is still being set.
Experience and Supporting Team
Barati is a three-time Imperial alumnus who co-founded and ran a technology startup before building an automated venture investment platform and working across financial institutions. He is running Project Ventures as a solo general partner but is supported by a London-based team including Lisa Portz, Maxwell Munford and Riccardo Bassiri. Interns, student groups, advisers and an expert network have also contributed to the fund's development.
Concentration Risk and Follow-On Capacity
The constraint built into this model is concentration risk. A first close of this size supports a small number of positions with limited reserves for follow-on investments, meaning the fund will likely be diluted in later rounds unless subsequent closes materially increase the pool. Whether Project Ventures can hold its stakes through Series A will depend on how much more it raises and how quickly.
Project Ventures' first close is modest but strategically distinctive because it uses a single university's research and talent pipeline as an investment filter. The firm's success will depend on whether the Imperial network can generate enough institutional-quality deals and whether later closes strengthen its ability to defend ownership. For now, the announcement highlights a growing segment of the UK venture market that is raising in stages and betting on proximity to specialist deal flow.
Source: Sifted