The first ‘major’ growth investment will facilitate the expansion of Stauning’s distillery in Denmark.

The company's production process of malting in-house and distilling in small stills will continue, with the number of stills expanding from four to twenty, allowing Stauning to increase its current production capacity from 15,000 litres per year to 750,000 litres per year.

In addition to the capital investment, Diageo and Distill Ventures will support the founders of Stauning as they scale production and plan their growth in export markets.

Stauning Whisky was created in 2015 by nine friends who started making whisky as a hobby.

Alex Munch, co-founder Stauning, said: “We can’t wait to build the distillery of our dreams and are excited to be making more of the whisky we love and sharing it with the world.”

Frank Lampen, co-founder of Distill Ventures, added: “This deal represents a step change in the scale of investments Distill Ventures is undertaking. When we find outstanding businesses, we can fund major capital projects and investment in stock as we are in this case. Our focus is on helping entrepreneurs to realise their vision and we are delighted to be working with Stauning, as they scale their business and take their great whiskies beyond Denmark."

Distill Ventures evaluates hundreds of businesses each year across the world. The programme began discussing a possible investment in Stauning in summer of 2014.