Every day, Global University Venturing rounds up the smaller investments from across the university innovation ecosystem in its deal net.

Vesper, a US-based smart sensor developer spun out of University of Michigan, raised $18m in funding on Wednesday. The round included Applied Ventures, the corporate VC arm of semiconductor technology producer Applied Materials, as well as e-commerce group Amazon’s Alexa Fund, audio equipment producer Bose, electronics manufacturer Unitrontech, fabless semiconductor maker MegaChips and electronics distributor World Peace Group. The round was led by Accomplice and included Sands Capital, Gopher Asset Management and Industrial Technology Research Institute’s Industrial Technology Investment. It has received a total of at least $38m as of its $23m series B round in 2018. S2W, a South Korea-based cybersecurity software provider spun out of Korea Advanced Institute of Science & Technology, picked up more than $10m in series B financing yesterday from YG Investment, the corporate VC arm of entertainment agency YG Entertainment, as well as LB Investment, KDB Development Bank, Magellan Technology Investment, Mirae Asset Venture Investment, Lotte Ventures and DS Asset Management. The spinout concurrently disclosed it previously raised a $3.5m series A round in March 2020. TileDB, a US-based database software developer based on joint research at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and semiconductor producer Intel’s R&D arm Intel Labs, raised an undisclosed amount on Wednesday from aerospace manufacturer Lockheed Martin and mobile network operator NTT Docomo, through their Lockheed Martin Ventures and NTT Docomo Ventures units. The company’s overall funding stood at $20m as of July 2020 when it received $15m in series A funding from Intel’s investment arm Intel Capital and fellow returning backers Nexus Venture Partners and Big Pi Ventures as well as Two Bear Capital and Uncorrelated Ventures. Salinity Solutions, a UK-based desalination system developer, was spun out of University of Birmingham today with an undisclosed amount of funding from Clean Engineering. Founded in April 2020 as Desal Solutions, Salinity Solutions will look to partner companies in the mineral exploration and mining industries. Its compact, energy-efficient technology can concentrate salts in ground water to extract a mineral-rich brine. – Additional reporting by Robert Lavine

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Thierry Heles

Thierry Heles is the editor of Global University Venturing, host of the Beyond the Breakthrough interview podcast and responsible for the monthly GUV Gazette (sign up here for free).