The UK startup ecosystem closed a strong funding week as biotech, AI infrastructure and vertical SaaS drove £2.13 billion in disclosed investment between 12 and 16 January. The period saw a mix of mega-round discussions, late-stage growth capital and steady early-stage activity.
Week at a glance
19 startups raised capital
£2.13bn disclosed funding
29 founders backed
60 VCs and angel investors involved
AI Infrastructure and Tooling Take Centre Stage
Investment continued to flow into the foundations of modern AI, spanning data centres, reinforcement learning platforms and compliance automation. As enterprise adoption accelerates, investors are backing both capital-intensive infrastructure and practical tooling that reduces deployment friction.
Nscale is reportedly in talks to raise around £2 billion to expand onshore AI data centres and deploy specialised GPUs, positioning itself as a strategic infrastructure partner to cloud providers. AgileRL raised £5.5 million to scale its reinforcement learning platform, open a San Francisco office and reduce training time and costs by up to tenfold. Karavel secured £1.25 million in pre-seed funding to centralise regulatory compliance workflows for regulated industries, while Spot Ship raised £1 million to apply AI to ship chartering, cutting booking cycles from days to hours.
Collectively, the deals highlight continued investor appetite for both heavy infrastructure bets and focused enterprise tools, with long-term success hinging on cloud partnerships and recurring contracts.
This week’s AI & Infrastructure deals:
Nscale – £2bn (talks ongoing)
AgileRL – £5.5m
Karavel – £1.25m
Spot Ship – £1m
Biotech Platforms Combine Lab Scale with AI
Biotech and healthtech funding this week clustered around platforms that merge experimental capacity with data generation for AI-driven discovery. Investors are increasingly backing companies that control both wet-lab execution and model training inputs.
Cambridge-based bit.bio raised £40 million in a Series C led by M&G to expand its human cell programming products into toxicology and manufacturing. Nuclera added £8.91 million to its Series C to enhance its benchtop microfluidics platform for antibody expression and validation. Oxford-based Allos AI raised £4 million to apply causal AI to reformulating complex generics, while OutSee closed a £2.5 million seed follow-on alongside a collaboration to validate genomics targets identified by its Nomaly AI platform.
The concentration of deals around Cambridge and Oxford continues to reinforce the region’s strength in AI-enabled life sciences.
This week’s Biotech & Healthtech deals:
bit.bio – £40m
Nuclera – £8.91m
Allos AI – £4m
OutSee – £2.5m
Sustainability Shifts from Reporting to Operations
Sustainability investment this week focused less on disclosure tools and more on operational solutions with measurable impact. Early-stage capital is backing biodiversity action, circular materials and novel energy harvesting with clear customer use cases.
Verna raised £3 million to scale its nature recovery software, enabling organisations to move from reporting to active biodiversity programmes. Replacer secured £200,000 to grow its marketplace for replacing single-use plastics with circular alternatives. Ionech raised £2 million to pilot its Air Voltaic Cell technology, harvesting energy from ambient air in commercial refrigeration and other energy-intensive equipment.
Investors appear to favour pilots, partnerships and near-term deployment over long-horizon climate moonshots.
This week’s Greentech & Climate deals:
Verna – £3m
Replacer – £200k
Ionech – £2m
Vertical SaaS and Real-Time Security Attract Growth Capital
B2B SaaS and enterprise security dominated growth-stage funding, with investors backing sector-specific platforms and real-time risk monitoring tools.
Trybe raised £23 million in a Series A led by Five Elms Capital to scale its spa and leisure management platform globally, accelerating AI features and embedded payments. Cyb3r Operations secured £4 million led by Octopus Ventures to build continuous supplier cyber-risk monitoring for security teams. Midnite raised approximately £26.04 million in a Series C led by Raine Partners to expand internationally and further develop its in-house sportsbook and casino platform.
The trend reflects sustained demand for vertical SaaS businesses that can embed payments, risk and compliance into core workflows.
This week’s SaaS, Security & Enterprise deals:
Trybe – £23m
Cyb3r Operations – £4m
Midnite – £26.04m
Deep Tech Draws Patient Capital
Capital-intensive deep tech continued to attract funding, spanning quantum computing infrastructure and satellite-based environmental analytics.
Haiqu raised £8 million in a seed round to develop a hardware-aware operating system for quantum applications and reduce cloud compute costs. BirdsEyeView secured a seven-figure undisclosed investment to expand its satellite-driven wildfire modelling platform and scientific teams in North America and Australia.
These deals underline investor willingness to fund long-horizon technologies where potential markets are large, with commercial traction likely to hinge on partnerships with cloud providers, insurers and governments.
This week’s Deep Tech & Quantum/Space deals:
Haiqu – £8m
BirdsEyeView – undisclosed.
