IW Capital announces £2m investment in Location Live to spearhead global expansion

IW Capital, a leading private equity house, has today announced a £2m investment in Location Live – the UK’s premier locations planning specialist for the Live Marketing sector. This injection of capital will aid the group’s expansion into international markets, whilst focusing on the development of its proprietary digital marketplace and platform LO:LIVE, which saw exponential growth during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Driven by innovation and its unique insights into consumer behaviour in this sector, The Location Live Group helps brands connect physically with audiences in real life and the rapidly evolving Metaverse. In this fast-changing landscape, they are focused on providing the best experience for brands to discover and book locations within any environment worldwide.

As part of a directed digital strategy for 2022, the funds will be used to expand the LO:LIVE platform – a tool that allows users to source, plan and book locations for experiential activations – into 8 countries throughout Europe in Q2, and The USA and Asia early in 2023.

The group will also deploy funds to accelerate the development and release of LO:LIVE 2.0 with its unique front-end search tool and data functions which broaden location planning capabilities through unique marketplace statistics and rating analyses.

The Series A investment has been secured by Mayfair-based investment firm IW Capital, who are specialists in funding high-growth companies using proprietary technology at the heart of their strategy. They have now invested over £120m in UK SMEs and have accumulated an impressive sector-agnostic portfolio of companies, helping to drive economic growth across the nation.

Neil Jones, CEO of Location Live Group commented:
“We are delighted to take on board some rocket fuel for us to meet market demand internationally and expand our franchise into Europe, the USA and Asia. The process of searching, planning, and booking experiential space is unnecessarily cumbersome and our mission is to simplify, the process for brands to discover and book brand spaces, with a more data driven approach. This will improve market access to brand activation locations for a broader creative community.”

Chris Soames, Investment Director at IW Capital said:
“The clear and defined strategy, the scale of the opportunity and energy and drive from the management of Location Live, made this a very simple decision to invest. Rarely do you see such a transparent opportunity for growth with evident market preparedness and matched ambition from the management.”

Location Live launched LO:LIVE mid-pandemic after three years of planning and development. This helped to reignite the experiential market and for the sector to quickly rebound during the recovery. It now has over 1,200 platform users and over 1,000 prime brand-activation spaces that are searched over 2,000 times per week by brands, media, creative and experiential agencies. The platform also provides the group with a rich source of data and unique insights into preference trends with experiential activity to help them inform the marketplace and provide the best solutions for its clients.