Why Limited Partners Sell Interests in Affordable Housing

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Synkrino - A Beneficiary of UC Berkeley’s

Headquartered in Los Angeles, California, SP Investment Fund invests in social positive investments in affordable housing and in emerging technology companies that solve big problems. One such emerging technology company that SP has invested in is SF17 Therapeutics, which recently changed its name to Synkrino.

Synkrino leverages artificial intelligence to develop precision immune therapies. The company uses patient-generated data to develop targeted treatments for both complex auto-inflammatory and auto-immune diseases. It was part of Y Combinator’s 2018 cohort and even joined the CITRIS Foundry portfolio of science companies that same year.

CITRIS Foundry is a highly competitive program by UC Berkeley that helps innovators make an impact in the world. The innovation hub selects a committed group of entrepreneurs every year and gives them access to the university’s resources, enabling them to leapfrog their innovations from conception to commercialization.

The program only admits transformative technologies with the potential to affect their industries positively. The program provides entrepreneurs with access to UC Berkeley’s specialized laboratories, on-campus workspace to accommodate growing teams, and direct support from Foundry Fellows drawn from the Haas School of Business, College of Engineering.

Since its founding in 2013, CITRIS Foundry has supported 65 projects and raised more than $100 million. Other companies chosen alongside Synkrino in the CITRIS Foundry 2018 group were Threestone Analytics and Corshell Technologies. 

The Process of Regenerating Liver Cells through Hepatocyte Fusion

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India's Razorpay Becomes Tech Unicorn In $100mil Series D

Based in Los Angeles, SP Investment Fund specializes in social impact investing and makes a wide array of such investments in affordable housing, healthcare, and emerging technologies and economies. One of SP Investment Fund's 2015 seed stage investments, an Indian fintech company called Razorpay, recently become part of the coveted unicorn club through a new $100mil Series D financing round. The Series D round was co-led by Singapore's sovereign wealth fund GIC and Sequoia India. Existing investors include Ribbit Capital, Tiger Global, Y Combinator.

Razorpay is an online payments platform founded by Harshil Mathur and Shashank Kumar which has in recent years has expanded its offerings to include loans to businesses, credit cards and neo-banking platform. The early team at Razorpay shared a single apartment, but Razorpay has since become the largest payments provider for business in India.

In total, Razorpay has raised in excess of $200mil from investors to date. 

How OpenTrons Is Disrupting Lab Automation

California-based investment firm SP Investment Fund is at the forefront of investing capital in emergent technologies in the life sciences, robotics, and biotechnology fields. One such investment is SP Investment Fund's investment in the laboratory equipment manufacturer OpenTrons, which aims to streamline routine procedures in the biotechnology industry.

OpenTrons develops robots and open-source software that allow biologists to automate pipetting and other repetitive tasks. Currently, performing these sensitive tasks reduces the amount of time biologists can devote to analytics and other important work. While there are automated machines on the market, many are too expensive for smaller labs. Further, configuring these machines can be complex, and require intense training to operate properly.

OpenTrons hardware, labware and workstations offer easy-to-use and customizable pipetting machines at an affordable price point. The accompanying software allows biologists to program endless combinations of workflows and protocols with little specialized training. The company's use of open-source software also encourages the development of proprietary add-ons. For example, researchers at the Mayo Clinic created FusX, a gene-editing system that they now employ using OpenTrons technology.

Palm Oil’s Devastating Impact on the Environment

California-based real estate and startup investment company SP Investment Fund has funded affordable housing developments across the country. SP Investment Fund is also an early investor in C16 Biosciences, a company developing a sustainable form of palm oil derived from byproducts.

Palm oil is found in food, beauty products, and biofuels. For this reason, it is one of the most in-demand crops in the world. However, current farming methods have caused widespread environmental damage in producer countries such as Indonesia and Malaysia. Some of the most serious issues include:

Greenhouse gas emissions: Since palm oil is such a lucrative crop, farmers often convert large swaths of carbon sequestering rainforests into plantations. Clearing out forest flora can also raise soil temperatures, which triggers methane release.

Deforestation: The demand for palm oil drives farmers to destroy millions of hectares of rainforest. This destroys the habitat of tropical animals, reduces biodiversity, and contributes to soil erosion.

Polluted waterways: Palm oil processing produces chemical residues that can leak into groundwater. An average palm oil mill produces more than 2 metric tons of waste for every metric ton of usable palm oil.

Affordable Housing in the State of New York

Street of NYC

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SP Investment Fund invests in affordable housing apartment communities all over the United States, including communities in the State of New York. Recently, SP Investment Fund performed extensive renovations of two affordable housing communities in New York that serve seniors and disabled persons. 

According to data from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, 40 percent of people with low incomes in the state of New York spend more than 50 percent of their income on rent. However, some of those people get relief from federal rent subsidies that allow them to afford decent housing. 

Today, more than 1.2 million people in over 580,000 residences in New York State receive federal housing aid. Of that 1.2 million, more than 20 percent are elderly, nearly 25 percent have a disability, and nearly 55 percent live with children. 

In 2018, the federal government allocated more than $6 billion for New York rental support programs. These programs help prevent hundreds of thousands of vulnerable people from becoming homeless in a state where rents have been steadily climbing.