UCL chirps in time with the crowd

Chirp, a spin-out of University College London (UCL) has secured £750,000 ($1.17m) in a crowdfunding round held on the Crowdcube platform.

The company, which blew past its original target of £400,000, has raised more than any other UK university spin-out through crowdfunding, according to UCL.

The crowdfunding round attracted 365 investors, which included UCL’s technology transfer arm UCL Business (UCLB), Red Gate Software, and GuanQun Investment UK, which provided £215,000 of the overall total.

Chirp is developing a sonic data transfer app that can pass information between devices by translating data into an audio sound, or chirp, which other devices running the app can understand.

Cengiz Tarhan, UCLB managing director, said: “UCLB is delighted with the outcome of the campaign and pleased that the company can now really move forward with growing a sustainable, revenue-focused business based on a robust technology platform.”