Sistema_VC, the venture capital arm of Russian multi-industry investment conglomerate AFK Sistema, will invest $10mn in UK start-up SenSat, Vedomosti daily reported on October 1. The company founded in 2015 develops digital copies of physical objects for infrastructure projects.

The investment round was headed by Chinese private investment company Tencent, but other investors and shares of equity distributed have not been disclosed. Previously SenSat raised $4.4mn.

Sistema_VC will also help SenSat enter Russian market through large infrastructure projects. In 2018 Sistema_VC invested $2.5mn in another IT construction start-up TraceAir, which processes drone-captured information. 

Other UK start-ups supported by Sistema_VC include KisanHub optimisation for agricultural logistic chains, and DataSince marketing content personalisation. 

As reported by bne IntelliNews, the value of foreign venture capital deals with Russian participation in 1H19 doubled to $860mn as compared to $418mn in 1H18. 99% of the investment went into foreign IT projects and start-ups, with the average deal with Russian participation also doubling from $11mn to $24mn. The investment abroad beat the domestic investment of $248mn in the reporting period 3.5-fold. 

Sistema_VC has capital of RUB10bn ($150mn). In February 2017 Russia's largest bank Sberbank and Maginvest of Viktor Rashnikov invested RUB2bn in the VC in exchange for 20% stake. Other investment of Sistema_VC include VisionLabs face recognition solutions, AI-based virtual cybersports coach gosu.ai, and Russian freelance services platform YouDo.com.