Today Black Forest Labs has announced a $300 million Series B round at a $3.25 billion post-money valuation. Black Forest Labs was founded last year with a mission to build frontier models for pixels—systems capable of creating what cameras cannot capture. The team set out to develop models that understand intent rather than simply execute prompts, offering tools that turn imagination into reality for everyone from global enterprises to independent artists. The company is deepening collaborations with existing partners, including a16z, NVIDIA, Northzone, Creandum, Earlybird VC, BroadLight Capital, and General Catalyst, while welcoming Salesforce Ventures and Anjney Midha (AMP) as co-leads, alongside Temasek, Bain Capital Ventures, Air Street Capital, Visionaries Club, Canva, and Figma Ventures. Millions of users are already creating with the company’s FLUX models. Its open-source models rank among the most popular image models on Hugging Face, while its enterprise offerings are widely adopted across platforms such as Fal.ai, Replicate, and TogetherAI. Industry leaders, including Adobe, Canva, Meta, and Microsoft, are building on Black Forest Labs’ technology to deliver new creative experiences. Yet the company views this moment as only the beginning. Looking ahead, it envisions models that unify visual perception, generation, memory, and reasoning—laying the groundwork for true visual intelligence. The new funding will accelerate research and development. With a small, world-class team—including pioneers behind latent diffusion, Stable Diffusion, and FLUX — Black Forest Labs continues to push the frontier of visual AI. From its headquarters in Freiburg and San Francisco, the company is hiring and inviting others to help build the future of visual intelligence.

This week, we tracked more than 70 tech funding deals worth over €574 million and over 20 exits, M&A transactions, rumours, and related news stories across Europe. In addition to this week's top financials, we've also indexed the most important/industry-related news items you need to know about. If email is more your thing, you can always subscribe to our newsletter and receive a more robust version of this round-up delivered to your inbox. Either way, let's get you up to speed. ? Notable and big funding rounds ??  Quantum Systems’ €180M Series C extension lifts company to €3B+ ?? Model ML raises $75M investment ?? Overstory secures €37.1M in Series B round ??‍?? Noteworthy acquisitions and mergers ??  Metriks AI acquires Appare for €800M ??  Swedish AI company Lovable is taking over cloud company Molnett ?? Munich-based robotics unicorn Agile Robots is acquiring thyssenkrupp Automation Engineering ??  BKN301 acquires UK fintech Planky to advance AI-first banking ? Interesting moves from investors ? Onstage launches new early-stage venture fund ? Clover raises €30M to become the go-to investor for work and education startups ? Índico Capital Partners launches €125M Fund ? 6 Degrees Capital closes €154M fund ?? Germany unifies deeptech funding: DTCF to join HTGF in major VC platform overhaul ?️ In other (important) news ? Startups react to Autumn Budget, as the chancellor says ”if you build here, Britain will back you” ?? Revolut valued at $75BN, with Nvidia and A16z joining investor roster ? Skeleton opens €220M Leipzig SuperFactory to power Europe’s AI and grid stability ? Recommended reads and listens ? Empowering women to shape the future of food: inside EIT Food’s EWA programme ?? The eastern frontier is Europe's new critical deeptech engine ? Legal departments will be drivers of European sovereignty ? Europe’s diamond moment: a new semiconductor ecosystem in the making ♀️ Posters with purpose: the analog protest calling out the censorship of women’s health ? European tech startups to watch  ?? Ranketta receives €1M to improve e-commerce brand performance in AI search ??  Tyten raises £750,000 to bring AI-powered automation to the global facilities management industry ??  Yasu lands €850,000 to build the world’s first AI cloud engineer ?? Artificial intelligence startup Skymod AI received $400,000 in investment with the participation of ENA VC ?? Fintech firm Johix closes €300,000 funding round ?? Humbrela receives €161,000 to build a unified insurance intelligence layer

The German Federal Government plans to consolidate and strengthen financing for technology startups and scaleups. The DeepTech & Climate Fonds (DTCF) will be continued under the umbrella of High-Tech Gründerfonds (HTGF).   By integrating DTCF into HTGF, a seamless financing architecture will be established – from foundation to exit. The existing funds will continue investing in key future sectors – from energy and quantum technologies to semiconductors, biotech, industrial transformation, AI, software, and advanced materials.  Financing for young technology-oriented companies and access to equity for innovations in key technologies will be strategically consolidated within a joint public-private VC platform.  As part of this expansion, HTGF is expected to assume management of DTCF from February 1, 2026.  In addition, the German Federal Government has commissioned HTGF to set up a fifth generation of its successful public-private seed fund, scheduled to launch in mid-2027 – immediately following the investment period of the current HTGF IV seed fund. According to Dr Achim Plum, Managing Director of HTGF: “With the vision of a joint investment platform, we are creating the public-private VC structure that Germany and Europe need right now: continuous innovation financing – from technological idea to market leadership.  Companies like FMC and Proxima Fusion already show how seamlessly HTGF and DTCF complement each other. My co-managing directors Romy Schnelle, Sebastian Borek, and I thank the Federal Government for its trust in enabling HTGF to evolve into a comprehensive VC platform.” Dr Elisabeth Schrey, Managing Director of DTCF: “Over the past three years, the DTCF has firmly established itself in the market and built a portfolio of 19 outstanding companies. Through large investment syndicates, such as those supporting The Exploration Company and Cylib, we have been able to give these tech companies more time for development and scaling during their early growth stages.” Tobias Faupel, Managing Director of DTCF, adds: “Since the very beginning, DTCF has worked closely with HTGF. This successful collaboration will continue on the new platform with the same strong commitment to our portfolio and to DTCF’s investment focus.”  According to Dr Janina Jänsch, Head of the SME department at the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy,  establishing a VC platform as a new joint investment structure under the strong HTGF brand marks an important next chapter. "The DTCF management team has built a broad portfolio of technology companies, assembled a strong investment team, and forged important industry connections." The specific details of this integration are currently the subject of discussions between the parties involved.

Skeleton Technologies has officially opened its €220 million SuperFactory in Markranstädt, near Leipzig.  The facility is already delivering to Siemens, General Electric, and Hitachi Energy for European electrical grids, and to major US hyperscalers for AI infrastructure.  I sat down with CEO Taavi Madiberk to learn all about it. Skeleton Technologies is a European global leader in high-power, fast-charging energy storage for AI data centres, grid stability, mobility, and defence. It works with some of the largest companies in the world, from AI hyperscalers to industrial and mobility OEMs, and defence prime contractors, with customers that include Hitachi Energy, Siemens, GE, Honda, Skoda Electric, and Danfoss, among others.   Its solutions are based on its patented Curved Graphene raw material, protect essential systems from power fluctuations, stabilise mission-critical infrastructure, enhance performance, and enable wider electrification across sectors where power, reliability, and safety matter most. And, with a fully European value chain, Skeleton's supercapacitors use no lithium, cobalt, manganese, or other critical raw materials, and are based on the company's patented Curved Graphene material. What Britishvolt and Northvolt got wrong — and Skeleton got right Building full-scale industrial factories is fraught with risk — and Europe's battery sector has learned this the hard way. Britishvolt remains one of the continent's most high-profile gigafactory collapses: the plant was never built, its assets were sold to Recharge Industries (which also failed to advance the project), and the company was declared bankrupt in 2023. Last year, Italvolt abandoned its plan to build a gigafactory on the former Olivetti site near Turin, entering insolvency soon after. And in March this year, even heavyweight Northvolt filed for bankruptcy, with production at its Skellefteå facility coming to a halt in June. Madiberk offers vital learnings to the sector, declaring, "We started the company during the nuclear winter of energy and climate financing — back in 2009. That meant we had to grow organically. We always had a lack of capital, so we needed a product that truly differentiated in the market."  He believes that you cannot solve factory buildouts with money alone.  "Europe tried that — and failed. Skeleton has been lucky not to be over-capitalised. A lack of resources forces efficiency. If you hire hundreds of people for a factory scale-up, you get too many chefs in the kitchen. That's a killer in manufacturing." Strategic partnerships The company derisked its factory buildout by partnering with Siemens  "We used their know-how in logistics, digitalisation, and automation," explained Madiberk.  The company initially created a digital twin of the factory, ensuring things worked virtually before building.  “You can’t outsource your way to deeptech”: Crucially, Madiberk sees the company's biggest asset as in-house competence — people who have done it before. "The common logic is: hire great people and outsource to industry experts. But top management needs to be hands-on — in equipment supply, in process design, in everything. Certain things you cannot buy from consultancies or outsource." Talent has been another decisive factor. Taavi highlights the company's strategic hires: "For AI, we brought in an experienced founder who sold his company to Danfoss for hundreds of millions. Now we have a very strong AI team in Finland." Agility has been just as important. When heavy-duty electrification slowed, Skeleton didn't stay attached to outdated plans. "Companies must look at real challenges," he says, and pivot accordingly. Even though Skeleton Technologies was smaller in the past — delivering to BMW vehicles and Volvo robot trucks — its prior experience allowed it to scale.  Madiberk recalled being knee-deep in mud on the land slot in 2023:  "There was nothing. And I told shareholders, "Do not worry. There will be a plant here with equipment. We will make it happen."  Further, Madiberk also points out that the company's long-standing focus on materials independence has become a competitive advantage.  "I've told customers for 15 years that critical raw materials matter. We use no lithium, cobalt, or manganese — and have a European value chain. People ignored it for years. After COVID and geopolitical shocks, suddenly it matters." Inside Skeleton’s rise from niche markets to a critical infrastructure leader Skeleton Technologies also avoided the path many battery companies took: trying to solve everything with money. Instead, Madiberk contends, "We avoided the sexiest, shiniest markets. We never went after EV main batteries. We never went after long-duration grid storage. That was a conscious decision. Two years ago, some investors told me: "Taavi, these are niche markets. Look at the EV market and that demand. Why aren't you chasing it?" But we stuck to our core." Rather, the company focuses on two key areas:  "We keep the lights on in Europe." Five months ago, Skeleton had the largest marketing campaign in its history.  "People in Spain and Portugal noticed — it was the blackout. That moment was a wake-up call for Europe," shared Madiberk.  The 2025 Iberian blackout highlighted the vulnerabilities of interconnected grids, and the European Commission estimates that €584 billion investment will be needed by 2030 to modernise Europe's electricity networks. Madiberk compares renewables to driving without a safety belt, contending, "the blackout happened because of renewable fluctuations — the solution isn't to go back to coal or nuclear. The solution is adding a safety belt. " German transmission system operators now use Skeleton supercapacitors as the last line of defence for 200 MW building blocks for 1.25 seconds of stability to prevent events like the Spain/Portugal blackout. Skeleton’s AI pivot pays off Further, about 18 months ago, the team realised that heavy-duty electrification would take longer than expected. So in response, the company focused on delivering supercapacitors to US AI data centre infrastructure companies.  In 2026, US hyperscalers are expected to invest $330 billion in AI infrastructure, while Europe will invest barely $10 billion. European investment must rise significantly but the continent faces two structural challenges. First, electricity bills will increase further as energy-hungry AI data centres drive up demand. Second, only a small share of the value of AI data centre infrastructure is manufactured in Europe. Madiberk asserts:  "We did something differently: Skeleton built its own power electronics and software. That allowed us to get into the AI market. And this niche is becoming our biggest market. We're also fully vertically integrated: our own materials, our own supercapacitors, our own AI and grid product lines." AI data centres are overbuilt, overheating, and wasting power A typical AI data centre pulls full power for a second and then, during data transfer, drops GPU load almost to zero — a cycle that repeats constantly. These rapid fluctuations, happening 24/7, create enormous stress on the grid as tens or even hundreds of megawatts swing up and down. Right now, around 40 per cent of AI energy is simply wasted, burned off to manage those peaks, and grid connections must be built at twice the required size just to cope. The wasted energy also overheats GPUs — and even immersion cooling can't fully remove that heat — cutting into overall performance. In response, Skeleton built its own power electronics and software. According to Madiberk, by using Skeleton's solution, you can get up to 40 per cent more computing power. On a $330 billion investment this year, that's $100 billion in value. "We keep the lights on — and we keep GPUs cool. That's our dual mission." How Skeleton’s Leipzig plant powers the AI era Specifically, Skeleton's Leipzig factory plant manufactures the company's latest graphene-based supercapacitors, used in GrapheneGPU™, enabling AI data centres to cut total electricity consumption by up to 44 per cent by smoothing power peaks and reducing stress on the electrical grid. At the same time, it keeps a core part of the value chain in Europe.  By eliminating power peaks and overheating, GrapheneGPU™ unlocks 40 per cent more computing power from the same investment in NVIDIA, AMD, or other GPUs. Further, Skeleton is the only fully integrated European company in high-power energy storage, covering the entire value chain from raw materials to cells, modules, systems, and software. The company is built on deep tech and holds more than 70 patent families across the value chain. Skeleton's inauguration of the Leipzig supercapacitor facility follows the recent opening of its SuperBattery plant in Varkaus, Finland. The Leipzig SuperFactory will create 420 jobs in Saxony and is designed for an annual output of up to 12 million cells. Using digitalisation and automation solutions in collaboration with Siemens Digital Industries, the new plant reinforces Europe's advanced industrial base.

Swiss-based earthmoving autonomy platform Gravis Robotics has secured $23 million in fresh funding, co-led by IQ Capital and Zacua Ventures, with participation from Pear VC, Imad (CVC of Nesma & Partners), Sunna Ventures, Armada Investment and Holcim. Alongside the funding, the company has announced a series of new industry partnerships that further strengthen its position in the effort to transform global construction. Founded in late 2022 as a spinout from ETH Zurich, Gravis addresses key structural challenges in the construction sector (rising demand, declining productivity and an ageing workforce) by focusing on improving output rather than overhauling existing processes. Leveraging the team’s expertise in AI and autonomy, its retrofit system goes beyond basic command-based operation, adapting to real ground conditions via a learning-based control system that “feels the soil” using data from hydraulics, LiDAR, cameras and GNSS. This core intelligence is connected to Gravis Slate, a tablet interface designed to integrate into existing construction workflows. The same sensor suite that enables autonomous operation also augments manual work, creating a continuous data loop that supports performance improvements and the rapid expansion of autonomous capabilities. Designed to handle variable site conditions across tasks such as trenching, earthworks, grading and material handling, Gravis is built to complement human teams rather than replace them, delivering around 30 per cent gains in output, reducing rework and improving safety. Ryan Luke Johns, CEO and co-founder of Gravis Robotics, noted that the most effective path to autonomy begins with improving productivity today: By giving operators real-time 3D intelligence and the ability to shift seamlessly between autonomy and augmented control, we cover more of the work, accelerate adoption, and create the data pipeline needed to learn new capabilities from the industry’s hardest jobs. Gravis systems are already in use with major construction companies, supporting site preparation, stockpile management and the loading of trucks and screeners. Most recently, Gravis was deployed by Taylor Woodrow at Manchester Airport, in what is described as the UK’s first large-scale use of autonomous excavation on an active construction site. The company is also partnering with Flannery to offer turnkey excavators equipped with the Gravis Rack and is rolling out similar models via OEM dealer networks, including Develon in the UK and Kibag in Switzerland. Following this expansion, Gravis is now active in seven countries across the UK, EU, US, LATAM and Asia, representing one of the broadest deployments of autonomous excavation technology worldwide across both mixed-fleet and OEM-integrated equipment, and bringing autonomy directly into the earthmoving equipment rental market. With its latest funding, Gravis plans to further develop its autonomy technology, deepen and scale its industry partnerships and leverage existing global distribution channels to support the large-scale rollout of autonomous earthmoving solutions. 

Europe’s first dual-use unicorn, Quantum Systems, has tripled its valuation and raised €180 million in a Series C Extension led by Balderton Capital.  This follows its €160 million Series C in May this year, bringing the total amount secured in 2025 to €340 million, which marks the largest private capital raise in  Europe’s dual-use sector. The company’s valuation is now above €3 billion.  Quantum Systems has emerged as Europe’s powerhouse for unmanned systems, and the new capital will fuel its multi-domain expansion across air, land,  and maritime use cases.  Quantum Systems’ platforms and software are deployed by NATO forces across  Europe and the US, as well as in Australia, New Zealand, and most prominently in Ukraine, where its fleet has been operating since the start of the full-scale invasion in 2022.  Following the earlier Series C financing this year,  the company has already acquired and integrated AirRobot, Nordic Unmanned, and Spleenlab. The additional capital will also support strategic acquisitions specifically aimed at strengthening and expanding Quantum Systems’ multi-domain offerings. Florian Seibel, co-CEO and co-founder of Quantum Systems, said: “Triple unicorn status is a testament to our team’s ability to build systems and a company that performs in the most demanding real-world conditions. We will now accelerate our development of hardware, software and AI to become the defining leader in  multi-domain unmanned systems.”  Sven Kruck, co-CEO of Quantum Systems, said: “We are building the powerhouse of intelligent unmanned systems. Quantum Systems will accelerate its global  growth across countries and domains, to secure Europe, NATO and its allies.”  Rana Yared, General Partner at Balderton Capital, said: “We are partnering with Quantum Systems to help them continue to fulfil the promise of European sovereignty in defence and dual-use technology. As geopolitical instability rises and security priorities shift, the need for home-grown, trusted European innovation has never been greater. The Quantum Systems team pairs technical excellence with operational discipline and has demonstrated the ambition required to lead this category globally. We are proud to stand by their side, as Quantum Systems enters its next phase of scale.”  Quantum Systems employs up to 1,000 people across Germany,  Ukraine, the US, Australia, Romania, the UK, and the Baltic states and continues its global growth in hardware, software, and AI across all domains.  With the new funding, the company will accelerate its AI, software, and hardware development across all domains, connected by the multi-domain mission software MOSAIC UXS. 

For decades, silicon has been the backbone of the semiconductor industry. Diamfab believes the next era belongs to diamond. I spoke to CEO Gauthier Chicot to find out why and learn what it takes to industrialise an entirely new material platform. French company DIAMFAB is a spin-off from the Institut Néel-CNRS. Its technology is based on 30 years of R&D into the growth of high-quality synthetic diamonds for demanding electronic applications. It manufactures synthetic-diamonds that act as an alternative to conventional semiconductor materials(like silicon, silicon carbide (SiC), and Gallium nitride (GaN), especially in power electronics, which convert, manage or distribute high electrical power.  Diamond is no longer a laboratory material. It is becoming an industrial material. Japan’s Ookuma Diamond Device has raised more than €30 million, while more established US player Diamond Foundry is scaling rapidly — this week announcing a €753 million investment from the Spanish government to build a new microchip manufacturing plant.  For Diamfab, this rising international activity isn’t a threat — it’s validation. “Diamond chose me” Like many deeptech materials innovation spinouts, Diamfab was born in academia. Chicot admits, “I didn’t choose diamond — diamond chose me.  I studied semiconductor materials and started on other semiconductors, but then I got an opportunity to work on diamond during my PhD thesis. That’s when I discovered diamond and all the properties it can offer.”   Electrification demands a new class of power materials Chicot notes that as more systems become electrified—electric vehicles being a prime example—the need to handle large amounts of electrical power efficiently is growing rapidly. Most power-conversion devices today are still made from silicon, a material that reaches its limits when operating at high power. According to Chicot, for 20 or 30 years, we’ve been looking for materials to replace silicon.  “We’ve already moved from silicon to silicon carbide — every Tesla Model 3 has SiC converters inside the car. But we still want to improve efficiency and simplify the system.  The most effective material is diamond. It outperforms silicon carbide.” Smaller, lighter, tougher Diamond can withstand a voltage three times higher than silicon carbide and thirteen times better than silicon. Further, diamond is extremely good at dissipating heat, even better than copper.  “That means a diamond device can deal with a lot of power and evacuate its own heat efficiently. If a device heats up, its performance drops. So today we use fans and cooling systems, for example, in electric cars. These systems are bulky and complex. Diamond helps avoid that, “ explains Chicot.  Finally, diamond also reduces the carbon footprint.  Chicot details: “We need very small amounts of diamond material to fabricate a device. So from fabrication to usage, the footprint is lower.” In practice, the use of diamond makes semiconductors compact, lightweight, stable at high temperatures, tolerant to high voltage and radiation, and more energy-efficient than silicon.  It's invaluable for rugged conditions electronics such as EVs, aerospace, power grids, and radiation-hard systems, while there are also opportunities growing in radio frequency, optoelectronics, high-energy detectors, and quantum technologies using diamond’s NV-centre capabilities. Building the pilot line: from prototypes to industrial reality It's still relatively early days for Diamfab when it comes to rollout, with the team providing prototypes to customers and partners. In March 2024, the company raised €8.7 million. The team is building a pilot line, which will enable it to develop and test wafers and devices in conditions that represent industrial reality. “It also shows partners that we are ready for industrialisation,” explains Chichot. Further, there are already niche markets using diamond as a conductive electrode for other materials.  “It’s less “sexy " than full diamond power devices, but it generates revenue and helps us learn how to operate as an industrial company.” The art of transforming a conservative industry  Overall, part of the challenge is convincing customers to embrace what is still in many respects, frontier tech. According to Chicot, a lot of industrial players have heard about diamond, but 10 or 20 years ago.  “Back then, it was the beginning, and we need to update them and show that the technology has dramatically improved.” “We also need to show them that we are the right partner to work with. The industry is very conservative. We’re 20 people dealing with companies like Schneider Electric. So we need to balance showing what we can do, convincing end users, and driving the conversation through the value chain. We need to convince the end users first. We need to show them the added value and the performance gains. Then the end user will convince the semiconductor player to start working on it.”   Chicot contends that in France and Europe, companies are more conservative, but most industrial players are now convinced that diamond will be the next material for power electronics. But outside Europe, Japanese companies like Toyota have been exploring the potential of diamond.  “Interest is strong internationally. The question is when. It depends on how many actors—startups and big players—enter the game.”  When wafers scale, industry giants will listen Crucially, one of the biggest wins in Diamfab’s work is that it fits into existing supply chains. According to Chicot, while the beginning of the value chain —”substrate and the layer we grow” — is specific to diamond.  “But once you have the substrate plus the active layer, you can process the wafer in standard clean rooms. Metal deposition, lithography, and so on — it’s the same equipment as for other semiconductors. The only requirement is wafer size. Industrial facilities need at least a 4-inch wafer to enter their production line. But the equipment itself is the same. For example, to fabricate prototypes today, we use research facilities with the same equipment used for gallium nitride and others, just with an adapted recipe.” When the material is ready in sufficiently large wafers, the team can propose it to STMicroelectronics, TSMC, and so on.  “They will need a dedicated line to avoid cross-contamination, but the equipment doesn’t need to be different. The value comes from the diamond material itself,” explained Chicot. ´ Why diamond is Europe’s best shot at reindustrialising semiconductors Chicot contends that Diamfab's mission is to demonstrate that diamond has an industrial reality: “In Europe, we actually have almost everything we need to build a diamond semiconductor supply chain: research centres, substrate providers, device expertise, and major industrial players. This is an opportunity to reindustrialise semiconductors in Europe. Diamond power electronics is a new technology — and Europe is strong in power electronics. It’s easier to industrialise a new technology than to close the huge gap in silicon manufacturing, where Asia is already mature. We need to take advantage of this new technology to build a new ecosystem in Europe.” Lead image: DIAMFAB wafer diodes. Photo:Grenoble Alpes Metropole. Lucas Frangella.

London and Antwerp-based VC firm 6 Degrees Capital (6DC) has closed a €154 million fund, with the fund backing enterprise software, AI and fintech startups at seed and Series A stages.The fund is 6DC's third fund since its launch in 2023. Fund III will invest cheques of between €1m and €5m and follow-on capital up to €15m per company. The fund has already invested in Conveo, the AI research platform, and FlatPeak, the energy startup.The new fund is backed by a range of fund-of-funds, sovereign wealth funds, financial institutions, family offices, and high-net-worth individuals across Europe. 6DC is an eight-person early-stage venture capital firm with offices in London and Antwerp. Thibault D’hondt and Lucas Stoops, partners at 6DC, said: “We don’t follow the herd or wait for consensus. We build conviction from first principles and go the extra mile to truly understand each business. "This enables us to back founders with genuine commitment, not just capital. To move fast, cut through the noise, and make every interaction count."Wouter Volckaert, managing partner, 6DC, said: “As with previous funds, our ambition is to deliver top-decile performance and invest in multiple fund returners per vintage."To date, 6DC has partnered with more than 70 companies across its fund vintages.

Swiss-based ICT startup Humbrela has received €161,000 (CHF 150,000) from Venture Kick to advance the development of its AI-driven platform, which unifies insurance and warranty data and helps brokers, wholesale brokers and Managing General Agents (MGAs) better support their customers. Today, insurance information is spread across emails, portals, PDFs, credit card benefits and embedded products. This fragmentation makes it difficult for brokers to access structured data and provide timely, accurate advice to their clients. Because insurance involves risk, money and emotion, customers continue to rely on human advisors. At the same time, with general AI models achieving only around 52 per cent accuracy on insurance-specific content, the industry requires tools built specifically for its complexity rather than generic chatbots. Humbrela addresses this challenge by building a unified intelligence layer that consolidates policies and warranties, automatically identifies key protections and translates complex clauses into clear, actionable insights for insurance professionals. Co-founded by Semchs Zaidi (CEO), Simon Mazas (CTO), Mathieu Chabasse (CPO) and Sarah El Abshihy (Legal Counsel), Humbrela offers an all-in-one solution designed to streamline insurance administration and strengthen collaboration with insurers. It is aimed at all types of policyholders and can be used to complete, organise or consolidate different kinds of coverage (such as health, motor or household insurance), making the process simpler and more cost-effective. The company has already onboarded its first brokers in Switzerland and France and is in advanced discussions with wholesale brokers and MGAs across Europe. The newly secured funding will be used to improve Humbrela’s AI models for policy understanding and risk-gap detection, expand integrations with insurers, warranty providers and TPAs, strengthen compliance across EU, Swiss and UK markets, and support the company’s expansion with brokers, wholesale brokers and MGAs.

Índico Capital Partners has launched its sixth fund, Indico VC Fund III, with a target size of €125 million. The fund has secured a €30 million anchor commitment from the European Investment Fund (EIF), a part of the European Investment Bank Group (EIB Group) focused on equity investments in small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and mid-cap companies. Índico Capital Partners is an independent venture capital fund manager based in Portugal, focused on investing in global and sustainable technology companies with a connection to Southern Europe. Its funds invest in areas such as deep tech, software as a service, marketplaces, artificial intelligence, space technology, fintech, cybersecurity and ocean-related businesses. Since 2019, Índico has invested over €123 million in 53 companies, which together have raised more than €2.5 billion from global investors. Indico VC Fund III will focus on innovative technology companies originating from Portugal, Spain and Italy, while also considering opportunities involving companies from these countries that are currently based in the US, UK or other markets. The fund will target investments from Seed to Series B stages, with a particular emphasis on enterprise SaaS, AI, Deep Tech and companies operating in the spacetech and oceantech sectors. Stephan de Moraes, Managing General Partner at Índico, noted that the EIF’s anchor commitment, building on its role as a major limited partner in previous funds, reflects solid institutional confidence in Índico’s approach of supporting top-tier teams aiming to build global category leaders. He added that it also reinforces the firm’s track record and its strategic focus on enterprise SaaS, AI and Deep Tech across Southern Europe and its diaspora: We are strategically positioned to identify and scale the best global companies, leveraging the region's top talent and bringing them into the international capital spotlight. We believe that by providing smart capital and hands-on support, we are truly shaping the next wave of European technological leadership at a global scale. The EIF investment aligns with the EIB Group’s core strategic priority of promoting technological innovation and digitalisation, as outlined in the EIB Group 2024–2027 Strategic Roadmap. The transaction is supported by InvestEU, an EU programme aiming to mobilise over €372 billion in investment by 2027, and by Portugal Blue, a programme designed to strengthen Portugal’s blue economy by providing equity funding to start-ups, SMEs and mid-cap companies.

UK-based StirlingX, a drone operations and data intelligence company, has closed its extended seed round at a total of $11 million. The SAFE investment, which follows the initial seed funding secured earlier in the year, was led by the RCM Private Markets Fund managed by Rokos Capital Management, with participation from new and existing investors, including GALLOS Technologies, ONE9, and a group of angel investors. StirlingX specialises in advanced drone operations and data intelligence for complex, high-security environments, including critical national infrastructure and defence. By combining automated drone platforms, resilient communications, and AI-driven analytics, the company converts aerial and sensor data into actionable insights that support faster decision-making, improve efficiency, and reduce operational risk. StirlingX is currently delivering live projects with clients such as Murphy and National Grid, supporting pre-construction planning, construction-phase operations, surveying, and compliance. Dean Jones, CEO of StirlingX, noted that completing the seed round represents an important milestone in the company’s development. The confidence shown by our investors allows us to push further and faster in delivering sovereign, secure technology to partners across critical infrastructure and defence. With strong momentum behind us, we are well-positioned to scale and deepen our impact across the markets we serve. The extended funding will support continued product development, international market expansion, and recruitment across engineering, AI, and data science. It will also allow the company to scale its manufacturing and R&D operations at its Cambridge and Oxford sites to meet increasing government and commercial demand.

Tyten (formerly Fixo), an AI company for the next generation of facilities management, has secured £750,000 in an investment round co-led by Fuel Ventures and Concrete Ventures, with follow-on participation from Antler and several angel investors. Using artificial intelligence, Tyten aims to modernise and improve the global facilities management industry. Its platform combines intelligent workflow automation for help desks with guided diagnostic tools for technicians, delivering measurable operational efficiencies and improved service outcomes across the built environment. Developed in close collaboration with industry professionals, Tyten is purpose-built for the facilities management sector, a £60 billion market in the UK and a $1.4 trillion industry globally that keeps buildings running. Despite its scale, the sector has historically been underserved by tailored AI and automation tools. Tyten seeks to address this gap by redefining how repairs and maintenance are managed at scale. Tyten’s AI-powered platform targets two core bottlenecks: help desk administration and on-site repair execution. From the moment an issue is reported through to job closure, the system manages repair requests end-to-end. Its first automation module allocates tasks, contacts subcontractors, processes technician reports, flags missing information, and initiates follow-ups, reducing repetitive work and saving help desk staff up to two out of five working days each week. In the field, technicians receive step-by-step diagnostic and repair guidance, reducing reliance on manuals or videos mid-job. This structured assistance helps them complete work more quickly and accurately, closing orders up to 80 per cent faster and supporting improved performance indicators for service providers and their clients. The company was co-founded by Vladimir Pushmin (CEO), Sergey Nasonov (CTO), and Tom Petrides (CCO), who bring combined experience in energy optimisation, AI, and commercial real estate, along with first-hand insight into the challenges faced by facilities management teams. This close understanding of the sector’s day-to-day realities underpins Tyten’s product approach. As Vladimir Pushmin, CEO and Co-founder of Tyten, explains: Facilities management is the invisible backbone of every building – but the technology behind it hasn’t kept up and has lacked the innovation needed. We built Tyten to solve that, working hand in hand with technicians and help desk teams to understand their real challenges. The new capital will be allocated primarily to engineering and product development, representing approximately 70-80 per cent of the total funding. Tyten is also expanding its technical team to support continued product development and meet increasing customer demand.

Europe’s new wave of spacetech companies is building a full-stack ecosystem in orbit and on the ground. Young ventures across Germany, France, the UK, Spain, Switzerland, the Baltics and beyond are developing everything from small and microlauncher rockets, reusable spaceplanes and re-entry capsules to satellite buses, thermal Earth-observation constellations and high-thrust electric propulsion systems. Around them, specialised players are tackling ground infrastructure, space situational awareness, optical communications and “space-as-a-service” models that let customers share satellites and hosted payloads rather than build their own. Alongside these core space firms, dual-use and space-heritage technologies, such as laser systems and CO₂ capture originally developed for space missions, are finding applications in defence, climate and critical infrastructure, underlining how Europe’s space innovation is spilling over into wider industry. The following are the ten largest funding rounds in the European spacetech industry during the first half of 2025. Amount raised in H1 2025: €150M Isar Aerospace is a Munich-based aerospace company (founded in 2018) dedicated to providing cost-efficient, flexible launch services for small and medium satellites and constellations. With a strongly vertically integrated approach, from design and manufacturing to launch operations, they built their two-stage liquid-fuelled rocket Spectrum almost entirely in-house. Isar Aerospace aims to democratize access to space by offering launch services that combine flexibility, cost-effectiveness and sustainability. In June, Isar Aerospace signed €150 million convertible bond deal to bolster sovereign European access to space. Amount raised in H1 2025: €63M EnduroSat is a Bulgarian aerospace company founded in 2015 (headquartered in Sofia) that engineers, builds, and operates CubeSats, nanosatellites, and larger satellite platforms. EnduroSat combines hardware development with a “Space-as-a-Service” model, providing turnkey satellite solutions, from mission design and payload integration to launch and in-orbit operations. Leveraging a modular, software-defined satellite architecture, the company enables flexible, multi-mission satellites that drastically reduce cost, complexity and time-to-orbit. EnduroSat raised €63 million over two rounds in the first half of the year. Later, in October, the company closed an additional round ($104 million) to expand production of advanced small satellites. Amount raised in H1 2025: €50M Look Up is a French space deep-tech company dedicated to space safety, security and sustainability. Combining a global network of new-generation SORASYS ground-based radars with its SYNAPSE digital platform, Look Up delivers high-precision Space Situational Awareness and Space Domain Awareness services. Its solutions help governments, institutions and commercial operators detect, track and protect orbital assets, ensuring safer, more sustainable space operations for future generations. In June, Look Up raised €50 million to accelerate the deployment of its global network of space surveillance radars. Amount raised in H1 2025: £22.6M Space Forge is a space-tech company pioneering in-space manufacturing by developing reusable satellites that serve as orbital factories. Their flagship platform, ForgeStar, leverages microgravity and the unique conditions of space to produce advanced materials, such as next-generation semiconductors and novel alloys, that are difficult or impossible to manufacture on Earth. By combining orbital production with a return-capable, reusable satellite design, Space Forge aims to reshape industries from quantum computing to clean energy, while reducing carbon footprint and enabling a new era of sustainable, space-based manufacturing. Space Forge raised £22.6 million in May to advance in-space manufacturing. Amount raised in H1 2025: £20M Orbex is a UK-based aerospace company, developing low-cost, environmentally friendly orbital launch services for the small satellite market. Its primary vehicle, Orbex Prime, is a 19-meter, two-stage microlauncher using renewable bio-fuel, and built with advanced materials like carbon-fibre and 3D-printed engines for high efficiency and lower environmental impact. Orbex aims to help small-satellite operators access orbit affordably and sustainably, offering dedicated launch services, flexibility, and a reduced carbon footprint compared to conventional rockets. In January, Orbex secured a £20 million direct investment from the UK government as part of a Series D fundraising round. Amount raised in H1 2025: €15M Skynopy is a company that offers “Ground-Station-as-a-Service” for Low Earth Orbit satellites. Through a hybrid global network of ground stations, combining third-party infrastructure and its own antennas, plus a cloud-native virtualised modem platform, Skynopy enables satellite operators to send commands and download mission data with high throughput, low latency, and simplified integration. In June, Skynopy secured €15 million to build out a global network of high-throughput ground stations, enabling real-time satellite data downlink services tailored especially for Earth-observation constellations. Amount raised in H1 2025: €13.1M ATMOS Space Cargo is a company pioneering sustainable return logistics from orbit. Using its novel PHOENIX re-entry capsule (with an inflatable heat shield) the firm enables cost-effective, reliable Earth–Space–Earth transport of scientific payloads, experiments and in-orbit manufactured goods. By designing lightweight, reusable capsules capable of returning cargo from microgravity, ATMOS aims to enable regular life sciences research, material science, in-orbit manufacturing and even rocket-stage return, making space more accessible and practical. ATMOS Space Cargo received €13.1 million in funding in February, enabling the company to strengthen its engineering and testing capabilities and accelerate development of its PHOENIX 2 capsule. Amount raised in H1 2025: €12M OroraTech is an aerospace start-up, founded in 2018, that leverages space-based thermal sensing and AI to detect, monitor, and predict wildfires worldwide. Through its Wildfire Solution platform, powered by data from both public satellites and OroraTech’s own infrared-equipped nanosatellite constellation, it delivers near-real-time hotspot alerts, fire-spread predictions, and post-fire burn-area analysis. OroraTech aims to support first responders, governments, forest managers and infrastructure operators in safeguarding communities, ecosystems and assets from wildfire threats, day or night, anywhere on Earth. In May, OroraTech raised €12 million to scale satellite-powered wildfire forecasting tech. Amount raised in H1 2025: $10.5M Magdrive is a space-tech company developing next-generation electric propulsion systems, to enable more manoeuvrable, efficient and versatile spacecraft. Their flagship thrusters are designed for applications ranging from satellite servicing and constellation management to in-space logistics, offering compact, high-impulse propulsion without heavy fuel tanks or cryogenics. By pushing electric propulsion toward performance levels approaching chemical rockets, with the flexibility and efficiency of electric systems, Magdrive aims to accelerate the adoption of advanced, sustainable propulsion across the satellite and space services industry. In February, Magdrive raised $10.5 million to advance R&D on its high-thrust electric propulsion systems for satellites of all sizes, build a UK manufacturing facility, and establish a US office. Amount raised in H1 2025: €8.5M Aistech Space is a space tech company that builds and operates a constellation of small satellites to deliver high-resolution, high-frequency thermal and multispectral Earth-observation imagery, along with satellite-based communications, AIS/ADS-B asset tracking and remote sensing. Using its own instruments (including a proprietary thermal-infrared telescope), Aistech Space provides geospatial intelligence for applications such as deforestation and fire-hazard monitoring, agriculture, environmental and infrastructure surveillance, and maritime/air-traffic monitoring. In June, Aistech Space raised €8.5 million to advance its 2025–2028 strategic plan, including the deployment of the Hydra satellite constellation.

Czech-based Ranketta, an AI visibility platform that helps brands understand and improve their presence in AI search and AI shopping results, has raised €1 million in pre-seed funding. The round was led by Lighthouse Ventures with participation from Gi21 Capital. Recent data indicates that around 50 per cent of consumers already use AI-powered search to inform purchasing decisions, and 44 per cent now rely on it more than Google. Spending influenced by AI search is projected to reach $750 billion by 2028, yet fewer than 40 per cent of marketers identify Generative Engine Optimization as a priority for their organisations, and only 16 per cent of brands track their AI search performance at all. As a result, brands may remain highly visible on Google but have limited visibility within large language models if they lack tools to understand what customers actually see. Ranketta addresses this gap by measuring and improving brand visibility in AI-generated answers. The platform helps D2C, e-commerce, and B2B brands track how often and how prominently their products and brands appear across tools such as ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, AI Mode, and AI Overview, and provides data-driven suggestions to improve their placement. Ranketta shows which products LLMs recommend most, why they appear, and how brands can adjust their content to influence rankings. In addition to product-level insights, the platform tracks a brand’s overall presence in AI responses, including sentiment, relative ranking, and frequency of mentions, and identifies the articles and sources these tools rely on. An integrated AI Copilot reviews each brand’s data and offers tailored recommendations on what content to create and which citations or websites are likely to have the greatest impact, giving companies a clearer and more reliable view of their performance in AI search. Vojtěch Oravec, CEO and founder of Ranketta, said that his research experience revealed how limited companies’ visibility is into the influence of AI systems on purchasing decisions. He added that traditional SEO and analytics no longer reflect the full customer discovery journey, and that brands need tools capable of operating across both conventional and AI-driven search channels. Ranketta turns AI shopping into a real acquisition channel that companies can monitor, improve, and grow. Our mission is to ensure every brand can compete fairly in the AI-driven discovery landscape. Founded in 2025, Ranketta’s technology began as a solo prototype developed by Oravec, a 21-year-old Czech engineer and AI researcher who started coding at 16 and became a software engineer at 18. Before founding Ranketta, he conducted research in the group of Tomáš Mikolov at the Czech Institute of Informatics, Robotics and Cybernetics (CIIRC) at the Czech Technical University and later worked as a product manager at the enterprise company Henry Schein. In the two months since launch, Ranketta has already begun supporting more than 20 European brands, including Brainmarket, Boost.space, Purple Technology, and Sloneek. The new funding will be used to accelerate expansion across Europe, support entry into the US market, and grow the engineering, product, and sales teams, as well as advance development of integrations with Shopify and other e-commerce platforms. 

Future Energy Ventures (FEV), a global active venture capital advisor for digital and asset-light energy technologies focused on accelerating the global energy transition, today announced the closing of Future Energy Ventures Fund II with a volume of €205 million, along with a dedicated capital fund for Italy of €30 million. With the milestone, FEV positions itself as the largest European advisor for energy-technology-focused VC investments.  I spoke to Jan Lozek, CEO of Future Energy Ventures, to learn more, A near decade of energy investing FEV's goal is to support companies that are reshaping the energy landscape through digital solutions, strengthening national energy independence, and creating new economic opportunities. Lozek started in energy infrastructure and moved into venture capital in 2016. Lozek recalls that “around that time, the energy transition in Europe was already progressing nicely, and together with RWE we set up our first fund, committing €300 million to early-stage technologies.” “Our conviction then — and still now — was that the future energy system would be built on massive volumes of renewables, but also on the digital tools required to connect, manage, and orchestrate them.” Where buildings, batteries, and mobility become energy assets Since 2016, FEV has made around 50 investments in that space, and in 2023 launched its current fund, now closed at €235 million. Crucially, the Firm invests at late Seed, Series A and B, usually when startups have €1–2 million in revenue and are ready for the next inflection point. It invests in startups with AI-driven, software-based solutions that optimise grid efficiency, enable demand flexibility, and integrate cutting-edge technologies into energy systems.  Alongside renewables, FEV focused on electrification across buildings, industry, and transport.  “Coming from the energy sector, we were fascinated by how to connect batteries, buildings, and mobility assets to the grid and how to optimise energy flows across these systems,” explained Lozek. Electrification creates a new relationship between the classic energy system and the end-user sectors. Buildings, vehicles, and storage assets become energy resources.  “We back technologies that make energy flows more efficient and help connect these assets to the system,” shared Lozek.  Further, in buildings, the Firm invests in advanced energy management to optimise heating, cooling, and storage. Lozek believes the technology needed to accelerate electrification already exists —”and our role is to back the companies positioned to scale it.” He admits that earlier investment in sectors such as home energy management systems didn’t always scale at first.   “But now, with AI and electrification, the timing is finally right. Many technologies that once lacked market readiness are suddenly critical." The portfolio includes companies such as Chloris, Enspired, Feld Energy, EV.energy, Jua, Piclo, Reev and Station A, which are advancing changes in flexibility management, e-mobility, building and industry electrification and AI applications. Cracking the Series A–B bottleneck Crucially, FEV helps Series A and B startups scale their businesses,a stage where many struggle to gain traction.  Lozek highlighted the need to identify true inflection points, contending it’s crucial to invest where there’s both an immediate need and long-term scalability.  “For example, enspired, a company managing and trading battery assets using AI, is solving a real pain point today, but also sits at the convergence of a long-term global growth trend in storage." .Further, data centres are booming, and for Lozek the question is “how to connect them without compromising energy availability for homes and industry. Software that improves grid throughput, siting, and connection planning is becoming essential.” There are also the industry realities that startups face: “Energy companies often build for 40 years, so they’re cautious. Procurement cycles can be long, and changing legacy mindsets is tough. Our team’s sector experience helps founders navigate this,” shared Lozek.  He also believes that compared to the US, Europe has fewer strong exit routes.  “When you’re aiming for a five- to six-year holding period, that’s a challenge.” The good news: European countries are now gradually adjusting pension fund rules to allocate more capital to venture — an important structural shift. Geopolitics is rewriting the energy playbook The vision backed by FEV goes far beyond cleaner electricity. It imagines a transformed global economy in which universal access to locally generated renewable energy reduces dependence on volatile imports and gives nations real sovereignty over their economic future. At a time when environmental policies are under pressure and geopolitical tensions highlight the urgency of energy independence, this Fund close signals a fundamental shift toward energy security, economic resilience, and long-term sustainability. The transition from volatile fossil fuel dependency to locally controlled renewable systems is today both an economic necessity and a strategic imperative. According to Lozek, geopolitics has made energy independence a top priority.  “Reducing reliance on imported gas and oil has accelerated interest in renewables and technologies that help manage the system more efficiently. In Europe, and particularly in Germany, investments that strengthen independence from external energy sources make more sense than ever.” The Fund was initially supported by E.ON SE and the European Investment Fund (EIF) as anchor investors. It now also includes additional strategic and institutional investors such as KFW Capital, ABN AMRO, CLP, BGK, ISA Energia, Borusan, Zorlu Holding, Telos Impact, KELAG, MTR, and Sabanci Climate Ventures. Italy’s startup renaissance draws FEV in The Italian fund is fully financed by CDP and invests alongside the main fund.  FEV’s decision to launch a dedicated Italian vehicle was the result of three converging factors: deep team roots in the country, a rapidly maturing innovation landscape, and investor demand. One of the Firm’s partners, Jan Lesinski, grew up in Italy and maintains strong ties to its startup ecosystem.  At the same time, Italy has undergone a notable shift since 2016, with government initiatives and development banks helping to build a more vibrant environment for founders and even drawing talent back from abroad. The structure of the Fund also played a role.  “CDP wanted to support and back our fund, but they needed to focus their capital on Italy,” Lozek explains. “That led us to set up two vehicles with the same strategy — one dedicated to the Italian market and the other operating more broadly.” Energy as a new top-tier asset class Energy has emerged as the most compelling investment sector of our generation: security requirements, economic growth, employment effects, and cost-effective renewable energy converge into an area where clean energy technology is both indispensable for stability and an exceptional investment opportunity. This momentum creates ideal conditions for groundbreaking energy innovations that will complete the transition to a renewable energy world. FEV is therefore well-positioned to identify and scale the technologies that will define the energy systems of the future. "Europe has the innovation power, talent, and industrial capacity to take a leading role in the global energy transition," says Veronique Hördemann, Managing Partner and CFO of Future Energy Ventures.  "The key now is that political frameworks facilitate investment and scaling, so Europe can fully realise its potential in energy technology. The energy transition offers the opportunity to drive economic growth, strengthen energy sovereignty, secure jobs, and enhance competitiveness." An open door for energy innovators For startups or scale-ups interested in potential investment, Lozek urges.  “Just reach out. If you’re building digital or software-driven technology that can make a real difference in the energy transition, we’re happy to talk.  We respond quickly — either with interest or suggestions for other investors with a better fit. We see a lot, and we’re always open to connecting founders with the right people.”

Oslo-based Noteless, an AI company focused on improving how doctors document patient consultations, has raised €3.5 million in new seed funding. The round was led by Redstone, joining as a new investor, alongside Futurum Ventures and Farvatn Venture, who continue their support. Medical documentation has long been a challenge for clinicians, taking up hours that could otherwise be devoted to patient care or professional development. High administrative workloads are associated with burnout, reduced job satisfaction, and attrition among healthcare professionals. Noteless addresses this issue with an AI-powered clinical documentation tool that automatically generates medical notes in real time during consultations. Founded in October 2023, the company uses advanced speech recognition and natural language processing to help clinicians save time, reduce administrative burden, and support high-quality patient care. Since launching its first product in June 2024, Noteless has recorded substantial growth in its paying customer base, which has increased by more than 360 per cent since the start of the year. William Vossgård, CEO and co-founder of Noteless, noted that adoption in the Nordics has been strong, with more than one in four general practitioners in Norway and one in seven in Denmark now using the platform. Clinicians tell us we’re giving them back up to two hours a day, time they can spend with patients or on their own wellbeing, Vossgård said. Adoption is also expanding beyond general practice, with specialist doctors, physiotherapists, and psychologists using Noteless to streamline documentation workflows, support patient care, and free up time for higher-value activities. The company aims to use the investment to extend this impact to clinicians across Europe.

Helsinki-based healthtech company Gosta Labs has closed a €7.5 million seed round to scale its AI operating system for complex medical specialities. The round was led by Voima Ventures, with participation from COR Group, the Aho family, and both existing and new investors, including Reaktor and a group of notable angel investors. This follows a €1.7 million pre-seed round in 2024 and brings the company’s total funding to nearly €10 million. Cancer care is becoming increasingly complex. According to recent studies, by 2050, more than 35 million new cancer cases are projected across over 100 cancer types. At the same time, clinicians spend several hours per day on administrative tasks in fragmented systems with largely unstructured clinical data, and multidisciplinary teams must make rapid, high-stakes decisions across a growing range of personalized treatment options. Gosta Labs addresses these challenges with an oncology-focused AI operating system that converts each patient visit into high-quality structured data in real time. The system summarises and visualises patient journeys, automates clinical documentation, and captures structured clinical data relevant to patient care. It also supports quality of care by assessing key clinical parameters for each treatment pathway and automatically linking decisions to international guidelines. This helps oncologists deliver faster and more consistent care. The first real-world results from the Gosta AI Operating System were presented at the ESMO 2025 Congress. The findings indicate that the system generates high-quality consultation notes in real time, structured according to institutional standards. It also automatically classifies Performance Status and CTCAE toxicity grades. Oncologists were able to complete follow-up visit documentation in a median time of under two minutes, reducing documentation workload and allowing more time for direct patient care. Founded in 2023 by Lauri Sippola and Henri Viertolahti, the founders of Kaiku Health (acquired by Elekta in 2020), Gosta Labs builds on a track record of developing and scaling regulated digital health solutions globally. The team combines AI specialists with experienced oncology and medtech leaders, including Chief Medical Officer Dr Lionel Hadjadjeba and Chief Operating Officer Reetta Arokoski, both of whom have extensive experience in scaling cancer care technologies internationally. The new funding will be used to expand the reach of its AI assistant to oncology teams globally and to further strengthen Gosta Labs’ medical-device-grade product and AI foundation, enabling safer, more personalised patient encounters with reduced administrative burden.

London-based Neuracore, a robot learning platform focused on faster scaling and deployment, has closed a $3 million pre-seed round led by Earlybird Venture Capital, with participation from Clem Delangue (Co-founder & CEO of Hugging Face) and advisors from academia, hardware, and AI. Founded in 2024 by Stephen James, Assistant Professor of Robot Learning at Imperial College London, Neuracore is developing infrastructure designed to support the next generation of intelligent robots. Its platform enables robotics teams to move from data collection to deploying machine learning models in a matter of days rather than months, eliminating the bottlenecks that currently consume up to 80 per cent of engineering time. Neuracore’s software stack replaces fragmented robotics setups with a unified, cloud-based system that manages asynchronous data collection, visualisation, training, and deployment. By bringing the full robot learning pipeline into a single platform, Neuracore enables teams to focus more on development and experimentation rather than infrastructure. The platform is already used by more than 50 organisations across commercial and academic robotics, including collaborations with leading hardware manufacturers. Commenting on the investment, Stephen James, founder and CEO, noted that his experience across academic and industrial robotics showed that teams, from research groups to warehouse automation startups, were repeatedly rebuilding similar infrastructure from the ground up. Our mission is to eliminate that duplication and democratize access to high-performance robot learning tools. With this funding and our free academic program, we’re enabling both researchers and companies to focus on advancing robotics itself, not on building the pipelines to support it. Neuracore is also introducing a free academic program alongside the funding. Through this program, universities and research institutions worldwide will receive unrestricted access to the full enterprise platform, the same infrastructure used by Neuracore’s commercial customers. Academic researchers are building the foundation for tomorrow’s robots. They shouldn’t waste months setting up data pipelines - they should be innovating. We want Neuracore to be the backbone that lets them do that. James added. The initiative is intended to reduce the accessibility gap between research and industry by providing universities and robotics labs with free, unlimited use of the platform, supporting faster experimentation, collaboration, and reproducibility across institutions. The new investment will accelerate product development, expand the engineering team, and support Neuracore’s broader growth, including scaling its open-source robot learning community.

UK startups have broadly welcomed measures introduced by the UK chancellor in the Autumn budget, designed to get entrepreneurs to scale their startups in the UK, which has been a long-running concern for the industry.However, the response from the fintech industry was mixed, with some praising the budget while others bemoaning that more was not offered to support UK fintech as it looks to retain its leadership position.In a budget, which saw the chancellor raise taxes by £26bn, chancellor Rachel Reeves said: “We are sending a simple message to the world, if you build here, Britain will back you.”Unveiling measures to support startup businesses in the UK, the chancellor added: “Growth begins with the spark of an entrepreneur. Half of new jobs in Britain are created by scaleup businesses and we want those jobs created here, not somewhere else. “Our job is to make Britain the best place in the world to startup, to scaleup and to stay.”Measures announced in the budget designed to support entrepreneurs scaling up businesses in the UK include broadening the eligibility requirements for the Enterprise Investment Scheme (EIS) and Venture Capital Trust (VCT) schemes.UK businesses will also get a three-year exemption from stamp duty tax if they choose to IPO in Britain, while the chancellor also launched a “call for evidence” on how the tax system can better back entrepreneurs, with founders and investors at the heart of the review.An uplift in the Enterprise Management Incentive (EMI) limits, which enables employees to share in the equity value they create, was also announced.Industry reaction  Dom Hallas, executive director, Startup Coalition, said: “In a tricky budget the chancellor made one thing clear - entrepreneurs and founders building high-growth businesses are the engine of growth in the UK. Is this everything that founders could ever need?  "No. But does this Budget show that the Government has seriously listened to founders and tried to make things better to build and scale a startup in the UK? Emphatically yes.  "Big progress on expanding share options, doubling the scale of EIS and VCTs to back scaleups, and looking again at how entrepreneurs are incentivised in our tax system will make a material difference to founders building today and in the future.” Alessandro Maiano, co-founder and CEO, Wilbe, said: “This budget makes clear just how much responsibility taxpayers continue to carry in funding the riskiest stages of scientific discovery.  “If the UK wants to become a true science superpower, public investment must be complemented by far greater incentives for private individuals, philanthropists and foundations to support early scientific discovery. Without that shift, taxpayers will continue to take the risk without ever sharing in the reward.” Cat Mora, director of research operations, Phasecraft, said: “We welcome the UK Government’s commitment to targeted investment in innovation and the message that if you build here, Britain will back you.  "Widening eligibility for enterprise incentives and expanding EIS schemes will go some way towards helping this. To stay ahead, the UK must back the quantum companies bringing real use cases to today’s limited hardware, not just preparing for the machines of the future." Sasha Haco, co-founder and CEO, Unitary, said: “If we want AI to genuinely raise productivity, the government must go beyond investment and needs to become an enthusiastic customer for startups. “As well as capital, founders need customers willing to adopt, test and scale innovative products. By using its own buying power, alongside targeted R&D programmes, the government can set the pace for the wider economy. That’s the clearest way to ensure the UK remains a global home for ambitious, high-growth companies.” Leo Labeis, founder and CEO, REGnosys, said: “Greater clarity on capital gains treatment, entrepreneur relief, and modernised EIS/EMI rules is exactly what founders have been calling for. This is a strong signal that the Government recognises how vital fiscal stability is for scaling high-growth sectors like RegTech.  “This makes the UK an even more attractive place to build and scale financial innovation and reinforces London’s position as the natural home for RegTech globally." Mike Walters, CEO, Form3, said: "The proposed support for expanding EMI and ensuring that the tax system champions the successes of UK business, founders, and employees is hugely promising.  "Preserving the UK’s status as a global hub for fintech will depend on the government protecting and retaining the deep pools of talent that this industry relies on.“It’s disappointing that there was no mention of any plans to back the progress made by the National Payments Vision.  "The UK is currently a global payments leader, and building out resilience in banking and payments will set the stage for the next decade of growth. “The government needs to build on its Mansion House pledges and ensure a steady stream of capital continues to flow into high-potential companies where it can directly translate into jobs and economic growth." Janine Hirt, CEO of Innovate Finance, the industry body for UK finfech, said: "Today’s budget was always going to be a difficult balancing act to manage public finances while driving growth.  "The UK fintech community was pleased to see the chancellor acknowledge very early on in her budget speech the importance of supporting entrepreneurs and founders, recognising they are key drivers of growth across our country. "We welcome her announcement of a call for evidence which will seek views on the effectiveness of existing tax incentives, and the wider tax system, for business founders and scaling firms, and how the UK can better support these companies to start, grow and stay in the UK. "This will go a long way in ensuring the UK cements its place as the best place in the world to build and scale a fintech business." Image: Pixabay

French Entrepreneur Samuel Tual has today launched Clover, a €30 million early-stage evergreen fund to back startups reshaping the future of work and education. Tual is an entrepreneur, Vice-President of the MEDEF and Chairman & CEO of Actual Group, a major player in employment and labour in France and Europe. Clover aims to become the “VC for Work”, an indispensable reference in support of work and education, acting both as an investment fund and as a structuring actor of the ecosystem. Designed and structured like a startup, Clover positions itself as agile, fast and scalable, with a simple ambition: to become the go-to platform offering far more than capital to entrepreneurs. Clover plans to deploy €100,000 to €200,000 checks in 20 to 30 investments per year at Pre-Seed and Seed stages, with the ambition of becoming the leading investor in the work & education verticals.  The fund supports top founders across Europe and the United States, where it is already firmly established with strong ties to the entrepreneurial ecosystem. Since May of this year, Clover has already invested approximately €1 million, one-third of which has been committed in the US, in areas such as AI, productivity tools, workflow automation, and workplace health. The investment thesis of Clover rests on two core pillars: becoming the reference “VC for Work” and rethinking the traditional venture-capital model together with founders. On one side, the world of work is undergoing a radical transformation driven by AI, new modes of collaboration, increasing demands for productivity, flexibility, inclusivity and sustainability. In France, the national AI initiative aims for 100 per cent of large corporations to adopt artificial intelligence by 2030, while global potential productivity gains via AI are estimated at US $4,400 billion over the long term. Meanwhile, as France itself faces economic and political uncertainty, marked by budgetary tensions and a tighter investment climate, many hesitate to invest or innovate. “I believe in the future of work globally, and I believe that it is precisely in times of uncertainty that one must be daring and innovative. It is imperative to accelerate so we do not fall behind and to safeguard the longevity of our businesses. If the environment is fragile, the future of work is being written now, invented globally, and the rest of the world doesn’t wait”, declares Samuel Tual. Hugo Mendes, Managing Partner, former entrepreneur and investor with Origins, will lead the fund’s construction and management. “Investing is like recruiting: you must recognise talent before everyone else does. With Clover, our goal is to be a true partner beyond the check, because founders don’t just look for capital, they look for teammates who care, who respond quickly, and who show up again and again. I’m proud to lead this initiative alongside the Tual family, with whom I share strong entrepreneurial values.” Lead image: Samuel Tual and Hugo Mendes. Photo: uncredited.