Weekly Briefing: AI, fintech and SaaS drive £195.7m in UK startup funding (1–5 Dec 2025)
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It's Friday, 5 December, and this is your Startupmag Weekly Briefing.
A busy start to December saw London and other UK hubs host a string of sizeable rounds, led by AI, fintech and biotech companies. Together the featured deals totalled £195.7M and show strong investor appetite for applied AI, embedded finance and advanced life‑science platforms.
AI: automation moves into workflows
This week investors doubled down on tools that embed models and automation into enterprise workflows, developer stacks and marketing systems. Demand remains steady for products that reduce manual work and speed decision making, a trend visible in seed and pre‑seed rounds from London teams pushing into the US.
Notable raises included BuiltAI's £4.5 million to automate commercial real estate underwriting and expand US and UK operations; Track Titan's £4 million to scale an AI driver coaching platform that analyses sim and on‑track telemetry; Searchable's £4 million to help brands measure and optimise visibility inside AI search engines; and Ascentra Labs' £1.5 million, led by NAP, to automate private equity due diligence and consulting workflows ahead of a planned US entry.
Taken together, the rounds reflect a London cluster pursuing both vertical depth and cross‑border scale. Investors appear comfortable backing automation across regulated and unregulated sectors, from underwriting to marketing discovery.
This week's AI deals:
BuiltAI raised £4.5m in seed funding to automate commercial real‑estate underwriting with machine learning. The company will use the capital to grow its US and UK operations and further develop AI tools that produce financial models and underwriting insight in minutes.
Track Titan raised £4m to scale its AI driver‑coaching platform that analyses sim and on‑track telemetry to improve lap times. The funding will support global expansion, additional sim titles and deeper hardware integrations for both hobbyists and professional teams.
Searchable raised £4m to help brands track and optimise visibility inside AI search engines such as ChatGPT and Claude. The platform gives marketers real‑time insight and AEO‑focused recommendations to improve how large language models surface their brand.
Ascentra Labs secured £1.5m seed funding led by NAP to build AI tools that automate private equity due diligence and consulting workflows. The capital will support product expansion and entry into the US market after encouraging early adoption by top consulting firms.
Fintech: backing cross‑border payments and embedded liquidity
Finance rounds this week concentrated on payments, multi‑currency accounts and embedded liquidity for SMEs. Founders are deploying capital to secure licences, deepen banking partnerships and embed treasury services directly into merchant platforms, part of a wider push to make cross‑border flows cheaper and faster.
Sokin raised £37.8 million in a Series B led by Prysm Capital to accelerate global expansion of its multi‑currency accounts and cross‑border payments platform, funding regional licences, banking relationships and product enhancements. Bourn secured £3.5 million, including a strategic minority investment from NatWest Group, to scale its Flexible Trade Account for receivables‑backed working capital and to extend SME account functionality.
The size of Sokin's round suggests investors remain willing to back sizeable infrastructure bets, while Bourn's tie‑up with NatWest indicates incumbent banks are open to strategic partnerships with fintechs. How quickly these firms convert capital into regulatory approvals and profitable payment corridors will determine the next phase of competition.
This week's Fintech deals:
Sokin closed a £37.8m Series B led by Prysm Capital to accelerate global expansion of its multi‑currency accounts and cross‑border payments platform. The capital will fund regional licences, banking partnerships and product enhancements as the firm scales its treasury and payments infrastructure.
Bourn raised £3.5m, including a strategic minority investment from NatWest Group, to scale its Flexible Trade Account for embedded receivables‑backed working capital. The funds will deepen account functionality and support partnerships to deliver on‑demand liquidity to SMEs.
Biotech and healthtech prioritise commercial milestones
Investment in biotech and healthtech this week focused on commercialisation, clinical trials and productised solutions. Capital targets ranged from tissue engineering and therapeutics to consumer hardware that pairs software with subscription services, all aimed at taking lab work to market and securing early clinical or commercial evidence.
BSF Enterprise raised £15 million from Blackstone Mercantile Group to commercialise lab‑grown leather, fund cornea trials and scale cell culture media products across tissue‑engineered materials and medical applications. yuv closed £9.5 million in a Series A led by Nineyards Equity to roll out app‑connected hair‑colour dispensers in the UK and to prepare for US entry while scaling patented hardware, AI software and subscriptions. HotHouse Therapeutic took £2.9 million pre‑seed to commercialise AI‑optimised plant‑based chemistry for vaccine adjuvants and advance its platform toward preclinical partnerships.
Collectively, these rounds underscore investor focus on tangible milestones — trials, IP expansion and scaled manufacturing. Regional strengths vary by specialism, from Newcastle teams pushing tissue‑engineered materials to London groups balancing hardware and software for consumer health.
This week's Biotech / Healthtech deals:
Listed BSF Enterprise raised £15m from Blackstone Mercantile Group to commercialise lab‑grown leather, fund cornea trials and scale cell culture media products. The capital will accelerate product launches, expand IP and support subsidiary growth across tissue‑engineered materials and medical applications.
yuv closed £9.5m Series A to speed the rollout of its app‑connected hair‑colour dispensers in the UK and fund a planned US entry. The round, led by Nineyards Equity, will support scaling of the patented hardware, AI software and subscription model to salons and freelancers.
HotHouse Therapeutic raised £2.9m pre‑seed to commercialise AI‑optimised plant‑based chemistry for vaccine adjuvants and other sustainable therapeutics. The funds will advance platform work to deliver scalable, plant‑derived adjuvants and prepare for preclinical partnerships.
Greentech: model‑driven discovery and valuation
Greentech and energy funding this week centred on AI, physics‑informed modelling and materials that support decarbonisation and value recovery from waste streams. Investors are backing products that sharpen asset valuation and accelerate materials discovery, reflecting appetite for tech that bridges lab research and commercial deployment.
Modo Energy raised £25 million to expand an AI valuation and benchmarking platform for batteries and electrification assets, targeting asset owners, operators and financiers. Mater AI took £1.5 million to accelerate discovery of thermoelectric materials that convert waste heat into electricity using AI and physics‑based modelling, with validation planned alongside academic partners. Feasibly closed a £200k pre‑seed to launch an AI geospatial platform to speed renewable‑energy planning and to run commercial trials with UK developers.
Each raise pairs model‑driven R&D with early customer pilots or validation work. The pattern shows funders willing to support both platform‑level valuation tools and materials discovery across a range of cheque sizes. Much of the activity remains UK‑centric but carries clear international applications.
This week's Greentech / Energy deals:
Modo Energy raised £25m in a Series B to expand its AI valuation and benchmarking platform for batteries and electrification assets. The funding will support international expansion and further development of AI‑driven models used by asset owners, operators and financiers.
Mater‑AI raised £1.5m pre‑seed to accelerate discovery of thermoelectric materials that convert waste heat into electricity using AI and physics‑based modelling. The funds will deepen R&D and validate materials with academic partners ahead of commercial applications.
Feasibly raised £200k pre‑seed to launch an AI geospatial platform that speeds renewable energy planning and site assessment. The funding will expand the engineering team and support commercial trials with UK developers to reduce planning delays.
SaaS and edtech: debt and credit to scale
SaaS roll‑ups, education models and marketplace builders used structured capital this week to fund acquisitions, scale operations and add AI‑enabled product features. Rounds ranged from large credit facilities for buy‑and‑build strategies to growth debt for edtech, reflecting a market where consolidation and productisation remain dominant plays.
Shop Circle expanded a credit facility with i80 Group to £75.1 million to accelerate acquisitions of enterprise SaaS products and to embed AI into its go‑to‑market infrastructure as it scales internationally. Oneday secured £3.2 million in growth debt to speed student onboarding and to develop an AI mentor layer for its entrepreneur‑led degree model.
The activity shows capital can be structured to support both roll‑ups and organic product investment. Lenders and strategic partners now compete with VCs to back scale initiatives where steady revenue models exist; the key question is how quickly firms turn debt and credit into profitable portfolio growth.
This week's Other (SaaS, Edtech & Marketplaces) deals:
Shop Circle expanded a credit facility with i80 Group to £75.1m to accelerate acquisitions of enterprise SaaS products and embed AI into its go‑to‑market infrastructure. The facility will fund further buy‑and‑build activity as the business scales its portfolio and operations internationally.
Oneday secured £3.2m in growth debt to accelerate student onboarding and develop an AI mentor layer for its entrepreneur‑led degree model. The funding will support the platform’s personalised AI coaching and community growth for founder students.
🎧 That's this week's Startupmag Weekly Briefing.
See you next Friday for another look at the UK startup scene.