About Us

Overview

The Chrysalis Fund exists to fund development, regeneration and sustainability projects in the Liverpool City Region.

Objectives

Chrysalis’ objectives are three-fold:

  • Facilitate the delivery of urban development projects that support employment creation and economic growth in the Liverpool City Region;
  • Fund projects that fall outside the normal parameters of mainstream criteria, e.g. those with fail to attract commercial finance or whose performance and outputs will be improved through Chrysalis participation;
  • Maintain a sustainable source of recyclable finance for the benefit of the Liverpool City Region, including cooperation with grant funders to minimise the grant component required to progress eligible projects.

Chrysalis funds viable projects and helps make projects viable. Its finance may be offered at commercial or sub-commercial rates and, without crowding out commercial finance providers, it may accept risk and/or offer terms that those commercial lenders could not.

Coordination

Chrysalis is part of the Liverpool City Region Single Investment Fund ‘family’. The Single Investment Fund pools all the City Region’s public resources for infrastructure, transport, housing, regeneration and economic growth, providing a single platform for investment and growth. Chrysalis is committed to aligning its offer with the Single Investment Fund offer.

Governance

Chrysalis has three levels of governance.

Advisory Committee

The committee monitors the fund’s progress, promotes potential regeneration schemes to help generate pipeline opportunities for new lending, and confirms the alignment of potential projects with the investment strategy. The advisory committee comprises relevant council officers from the Liverpool City Region boroughs alongside members from the management consortium.

General Partner Board

This is the fund’s executive board, charged with making binding decisions on projects as well as monitoring the portfolio and assessing the manager’s performance. The general partner board comprises:

  • Phil Davies, Leader of Wirral Metropolitan Borough Council
  • Gary Millar, Deputy Mayor of Liverpool City Council
  • Chris Brown, Executive Chair of igloo Regeneration
  • Giles Tucker, Partner, Global Infrastructure at QIC
  • Mark Rawstron, former head of GVA Manchester

Both the advisory committee and the general partner board are chaired by Jim Gill OBE, the former head of Liverpool Vision.

Liverpool City Region Combined Authority

At the third level, Chrysalis reports its performance to the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority. The Combined Authority is concerned with Chrysalis’ ability to deploy funds efficiently and in compliance with its strategy, its portfolio performance and its ability to work alongside other public investment sources, notably the Single Investment Fund.

Management

Chrysalis’ management is drawn from the igloo consortium of igloo Investment Management, GVA and GVA Real Estate Finance. igloo manages the fund, structures and executes new commitments, monitors the portfolio and maintains its stakeholder relationships. GVA provides an agency service, connecting potential projects to the fund. GVA Real Estate Finance provides finance advice on project and portfolio matters as well as a credit function designed to support the general partner board in making lending/investment decisions.