Updated:
Innovation Fund
Innovation Fund was established in February 2015 with EUR 13 million and raised its committed capital to EUR 35 million by October 2019.
Innovation Fund
Innovation Fund was established in February 2015 with EUR 13 million and raised its committed capital to EUR 35 million by October 2019. It grew out of the essenscia Innovation Circle, a mentoring collective of 13 former CEOs and academics that François Cornélis launched in 2013. The circle’s charter members—including alumni of Solvay, Janssen Pharma, Total, and UCB—had already mentored more than 100 projects before the fund existed, creating the pipeline that capitalized the vehicle. The fund invests directly in startups and SMEs that have progressed past academic research and secured intellectual-property protection. Its mandate spans chemistry, advanced materials, and life sciences, targeting pre-revenue innovators that can use the corporate backers’ labs, supply chains, and distribution networks. The limited-partner roster includes Total, Solvay, BASF, Carmeuse, Recticel, Sioen, Soudal, Domo, Ravago, Chemium, Arkema, Christeyns, and Hutchinson. Public co-investor SFPI-FPIM participated alongside the industrials. Investment structures include equity and convertible instruments, with the fund positioning itself as the first institutional check after grants and friends-and-family rounds in Belgium. The fund operates from essenscia’s offices in Schaerbeek and has not disclosed a dedicated investment team count. Chairman François Cornélis sets strategy, while Principal Pol-Henry Bonte leads day-to-day deal execution. In October 2019, the fund completed its last capital increase to EUR 35 million, bringing in additional chemical-industry limited partners. The Innovation Circle remains active as a parallel advisory body, giving portfolio companies access to operators who have run public petrochemical, pharmaceutical, and industrial-gas businesses. Innovation Fund’s architecture ties capital deployment directly to a standing corporate-advisory network, not to a traditional fund-of-funds or family-office model. Its investors are themselves potential offtakers, licensors, or acquirers of the technologies the fund backs. This industrial-LP structure means the fund does not need to build a proprietary sourcing team: the LPs' own R&D and business-development units surface the opportunities.
General information
Firm type
Generalist
Year founded
2015
AUM
EUR 35 million in committed capital (per the firm, 2019)
Location
Region
Europe
Country
Belgium
City
Schaerbeek
Corporate office
Boulevard Auguste Reyers 70, 1030 Schaerbeek, Belgium
Principals
François Cornélis
Chairman
Yves Verschueren
General Secretary
Véronique Wuydts
General Coordinator
Pol-Henry Bonte
Principal
Sector focus
Frequently asked questions
Who runs investment decisions at Innovation Fund?
Chairman François Cornélis, the former CEO of Petrofina, sets the fund's strategy. Principal Pol-Henry Bonte handles deal execution and day-to-day portfolio management, per the firm's contact page. The fund does not publish an investment committee roster, but its limited partners — major chemical and life-science companies — participate in the Innovation Circle that evaluates projects.
How does Innovation Fund source proprietary deal flow?
The fund was created out of the Innovation Circle, a standing committee of 13 former CEOs and academics from the Belgian chemical sector that has advised more than 100 startups since 2013. The circle continues to mentor early-stage companies, and the fund invests when those companies become capital-ready. Its corporate LPs — including Solvay, Total, and BASF — also surface opportunities through their own R&D and business-development units.
Is Innovation Fund a single family office or a venture capital firm?
It is neither. Innovation Fund is a corporate-backed asset manager organized as a Belgian sa/nv (public limited company). Its capital comes from industrial limited partners, not from a single family. The fund deploys the capital directly into startups and SMEs, with the LPs acting as strategic partners rather than passive investors.
What investment stage does Innovation Fund target?
The fund invests after academic research and development has been proven and intellectual property is protected — early stage but post-grant. It explicitly does not fund university research or pre-seed concepts. It will invest from start-up through growth and expansion stages, including spin-offs from corporate R&D programs.
Which sectors does Innovation Fund explicitly avoid?
The fund's mandate is limited to chemistry, advanced materials, and life sciences. It does not invest in pure software, consumer internet, or financial technology. Projects must have a hard-science or industrial-biotech component that aligns with the expertise of its chemical-industry limited partners.
How is Innovation Fund related to essenscia?
essenscia, the Belgian chemical and life-sciences industry federation, incubated the fund. The fund's registered office is c/o essenscia in Schaerbeek, and General Secretary Yves Verschueren is a senior essenscia executive. The Innovation Circle that feeds the fund's pipeline was also created under essenscia's auspices in 2013.
Does Innovation Fund co-invest alongside other institutional investors?
The fund itself is a public-private co-investment vehicle. SFPI-FPIM, the Belgian federal holding and investment company, participated in the capital raise alongside the corporate LPs. Beyond its own balance sheet, the firm states that extra capital is accessible for projects through its investors and partners, but it does not detail specific co-investment structures.
Profile maintained by Altss using OSINT (open-source intelligence), regulatory filings, licensed data partners, and verified direct submissions. Read the methodology. Last updated: . Continuous refresh with full update cycles at least every 30 days.
Need institutional-grade insight on asset managers?
Altss delivers:
Prefer a guided tour?
We’ll walk you through: