The company, which was founded to commercialize research at Imperial College London, invested 35.1 million pounds in companies in the last year, up from 14 million pounds.

Chief Executive Susan Searle said the UK’s top universities were home to a thriving community of entrepreneurs in the fields of life sciences and technology.

“The government needs to think creatively about how to make sure those businesses have access to support, whether it’s tax incentives or whether it’s continuing support for the technology strategy board, which is responsible for getting big companies to work with small companies and universities,” she said.

“We have four of the top 10 universities in Europe, and those four universities are in the top 20 in the world, and that’s a big differentiator for the UK.”

The British government has turned to the private sector to drive growth as it seeks to rein in public spending. But the challenge it faces was laid bare in economic data published on Wednesday, showing GDP growth for the second quarter revised down to 0.1 percent.

Imperial Innovations said it invested in 23 companies in the 12 months to end-July, founded by or based on technologies from the UK’s leading research universities: Oxford, Cambridge and University College London as well as Imperial College.

It led a 60 million pound ($92.4 million) funding for allergy platform company Circassia, representing the third largest financing of a private European biotech company for 15 years, and a 40 million pound funding round for battery technology firm Nexeon.