Spend management platform Payhawk has surpassed $100 million ARR – joining the roughly 250 private software companies worldwide to hit the ‘centaur’ milestone.

Bessemer Venture Partners estimates that these coveted ‘centaurs’ are around seven times rarer than the $1 billion-valued ‘unicorn’.

Over the past 24 months, Payhawk says it has rebuilt both its products and operations around autonomous AI agents, and its growth has accelerated as a result, turning $100m ARR into a proof point not just for its software, but for how an AI-native company is run.

 

A British man has become an overnight multi-millionaire after cryptocurrency he ‘lost’ for more than a decade was recovered – with scores of UK investors also set to finally cash-in.

Legal firm CEL Solicitors claimed it has successfully reclaimed Bitcoin worth more than £3 million for the man, who wants to remain anonymous, a landmark achievement in cryptocurrency asset recovery.

Chris – not his real name – originally purchased his first Bitcoin in December 2011, when a single coin was valued at just £2.94. The transaction was made via the UK’s first Bitcoin exchange, Britcoin, which was then renamed Intersango.

He lost access to his crypto wallet when Intersango went bust. But he’s finally had the total amount returned to him at its current market rate. 

Luffy AI, a pioneer of neuroplastic AI in real-time adaptive control, has raised £8.1 million in a Series A funding round. 

The firm was co-founded by former nuclear physicists with the UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA).

The round is led by BGF and joined by MIG Capital AG through its MIG Fonds, the Munich-based deep tech VC. Existing investors Bow Capital, Chrysalix, Momenta and UKI2S have also followed on.

 

Author: Jonathan Symcox

Revenues doubled at Brave Bison Group plc in its latest half-year period while profits also rocketed.

The marketing and technology group saw new revenue for the six-month period ended 30th June 2026 hit £23.7 million, up 97% year-on-year. This was ahead of budget and board expectations.

Adjusted EBITDA for H1 was £4.2m, up 87%, and in line with expectations. Unaudited net cash was £4.7m at the period end, it stated to the London Stock Exchange.

Author: Jonathan Symcox

Ofcom has today fined Virgin Media £28 million for putting customers on millions of calls through unreasonable effort, hassle and difficulty when trying to switch to another provider.

The regulator said its rules state that the conditions or procedures telecoms providers have in place must not act as a disincentive for customers who wish to cancel their contract.

However an investigation uncovered deliberate call-dropping tactics, excessive and unnecessary call transfers and putting customers repeatedly on hold for no reason.

 

Women entrepreneurs are driving some of the UK’s most exciting businesses – and the organisations backing them are continuing to outperform the wider market.

For the sixth consecutive year, signatories of the Investing in Women Code have directed a greater proportion of funding to female-founded businesses than the wider market, reflecting a shared recognition that backing women is not only the right thing to do, but the most economically sound thing to do.

The Code, a government-backed commitment to improve access to finance for women-led businesses, has grown from just 12 signatories in 2019 to more than 330 organisations today, including most major UK retail banks, venture capital firms, angel investors, and lenders. New signatories in 2026 include Nationwide and Innovate U.

The findings, published today as part of the Code’s annual report, come as Government works to unlock the UK’s full entrepreneurial potential by ensuring talented founders can access the finance they need to start and scale businesses, regardless of gender.

YFM Equity Partners has invested £3m from its British Smaller Companies VCTs in NextWave, an AI consultancy serving Tier 1 global financial services firms across banking, asset management, insurance and FinTech.

Many of NextWave’s senior consultants have held senior roles in financial services firms, meaning they understand clients’ operational and regulatory realities from the inside, not just in theory.

The business has also built its own delivery tools and software accelerators that allow it to work faster than a traditional consultancy, reducing the time-to-value for clients.

A major summit designed to strengthen connections across the North’s technology ecosystem is coming to Sheffield this October.

With a mission to fuel collaboration, innovation and global competitiveness, The Northern Tech Summit will bring together more than 500 entrepreneurs, investors, policy makers and decision makers from across Northern England to take part in the unique two-day event with a clear theme: collaborate to compete.

Organised by TECH SY, the first confirmed speaker at the event is internationally recognised data and ecosystem expert Yoram Wijngaarde, the founder of Dealroom. During the event, Yoram will discuss his journey, which saw him leave a successful career in investment banking in London and New York to launch the global data intelligence platform that tracks and monitors high-growth companies and venture capital ecosystems.

The event will take place at the iconic Crucible Theatre between 21st – 22nd October.

Author: Jonathan Symcox

The parent company of CurrentBody has achieved a £400 million valuation for the first time.

The Beauty Tech Group plc launched on the London Stock Exchange In October 2025 with a valuation of £300m.

Its latest trading update, announced this morning, has seen it hit a new benchmark after its share price rose 9% today. It is 26% up in the year to date.

Author: Jonathan Symcox

NCC Group plc shareholders have been boosted after an £185 million announcement by the Manchester cybersecurity firm this morning.

NCC said it would return £185m to them – representing a total return of £225m since the sale of its Escode division – leading to a 6% spike in its share price.

The new return will be via a combination of  a £170m tender offer, with shareholders invited to tender some or all of their ordinary shares at 145 pence apiece, alongside a new £15m general share buyback programme.

Nscale is to accelerate its global build-out of AI infrastructure after signing a $900 million revolving credit facility.

The London firm said the liquidity will also accelerate its capital deployment across the US, Europe and APAC.

The facility was syndicated across a group of leading financial institutions, including J.P. Morgan, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, MUFG, RBC Capital Markets, Bank of America, Crédit Agricole CIB, Deutsche Bank, Mizuho, SMBC, TD Securities and KeyBank N.A.

Chiron, an AI-driven platform enabling healthcare organisations to deliver personalised care beyond the clinic, has completed a £900,000 seed funding round.

The investment was led by specialist healthcare investor THENA Capital, with participation from Arāya Ventures.

It will support Chiron’s next phase of growth across UK healthcare providers, lay the commercial and regulatory foundations for future expansion into the United States, and further develop its AI platform which empowers people to become active partners in their own care.

Originally spun out of Founders Factory with support from Reckitt, Chiron has received multiple innovation awards and has been recognised as a finalist in global programmes run by Bayer and GSK.

Global media intelligence leader Onclusive has appointed Peter Harris as its new CEO following the resignation of Rob Stone.

Stone will move onto the board alongside owners STG.

Harris joins from CRM software provider Pipedrive, where he was president, with previous roles at Intuit and Deloitte. He joined Pipedrive in 2021 and was responsible for global P&L across 180 markets and 100,000 customers.

At Intuit he led partnerships and business development, while at Deloitte he established and managed their first investment vehicle in the UK whilst also building their first product launch in the UK market – Propel by Deloitte.

PayByPhone, a Hatfield technology provider for mobile parking payments, has promoted Rebecca Maisey to UK MD.

She will continue to report directly to PayByPhone’s President and CEO Jonny Combe.

Maisey, who has been with PayByPhone for 15 years, steps into the role after successfully serving as the company’s UK commercial director.

Sales recruitment and training specialist Furza has expanded with two new divisions focused on executive search and the outsourced management of junior commercial teams in fast-growth businesses.

The move marks the latest phase of Furza’s growth, following a triple-digit revenue increase in 2025.

The company has appointed Emily Bates as business development director to spearhead the expansion of the new divisions, Furza Talent and Furza Enable.

Furza Talent is an executive search service placing high-impact, mid-to-senior revenue and go-to-market professionals into high-growth companies.

Furza Enable provides outsourced management, training and development programmes for in-house sales teams.

Emily has joined Furza from recruitment vendor management platform Hiring Hub, where she was sales manager. Before Hiring Hub, she worked in a business development role at Pareto and as a recruitment consultant at Venturi.

She is the latest addition to Furza’s management team, following the arrival earlier this year of Claire Coulson as head of delivery and operations.

Furza, which is headquartered in Salford and has an office in London, has built its reputation by supporting companies to identify, recruit, train and enable sales talent through managed assessment and hiring programmes, alongside tailored training and development delivered through its academy.

Social agency SocialChain has appointed Tom Fenwick-Smith as executive creative director.

Fenwick-Smith joins from VodafoneThree, where he was senior conceptual creative and strategy social lead.

He will lead the creative department across Brave Bison-owned SocialChain and its sister agency Engage Digital Partners, reporting into SocialChain’s CEO, Jacinta Faul.

Author: Jonathan Symcox

Thought Machine has surpassed $100 million in revenue – but an anticipated stock market flotation is at least two years away.

The core banking technology provider has published audited accounts which revealed a previously unpublicised £45 million funding round as well as a fresh £30m from a new investor.

Founder and CEO Paul Taylor told Tech.eu that it has been secured from an unnamed tier 1 bank which also acts as a client.

On the £44.8m Series E quietly raised from existing shareholders in July 2025, Taylor refused to reveal the valuation this put on the business, saying: “We are trying to put less emphasis on valuation and more emphasis on commercial success. 

“Funding rounds are just not where we want the attention to be. We want the attention to be on commercial growth. 

“Hitting revenue targets is a far better indicator of success than saying ‘look how valuable we are’.”

Gyre Energy, an Oxford-founded energy tech company using AI and thermal energy storage to cut the cost and energy demand of industrial cooling, has secured around £1m in investment and grant funding as it expands work with larger enterprise customers.

The pre-seed round, led by Speedinvest with participation from Rule 30 and Plug and Play, has funded Gyre’s growth into large-scale cold chain environments including one of the world’s largest logistics companies responsible for moving and storing temperature-sensitive goods across global supply chains.

Gyre will install its AI-driven cooling optimisation and thermal energy storage platform within a chamber of a 140,000 square foot cold chain operation, with performance measured against an IPMVP baseline. Gyre’s AI analyses how the site behaves, forecasts cooling demand, and optimises the system to cut overall energy use while maintaining temperature stability. Its thermal energy storage then stores cooling capacity when energy is cheaper and greener, releasing it during expensive peak periods so the equipment runs less when power costs most.

The deployment is Gyre’s most significant to date, its first with a global logistics leader, and comes as heatwaves across Europe and other regions place growing pressure on cold chains, buildings, power grids and cooling infrastructure.

Palatine Private Equity has invested in OryxAlign, a specialist provider of mission-critical network design, build and managed IT services.

The strategic partnership will accelerate London-based OryxAlign’s growth across its core markets, including the fast-growing data centre and built environment sectors. 

The partnership will provide the platform and capital to pursue both organic growth and targeted strategic M&A.

 

Shares in Raspberry Pi Holdings plc climbed 5% today after it announced it had appointed Tim Powell as its next CFO.

The Cambridge-based firm said Powell, who brings over 20 years’ leadership experience across fast-growing public companies, will join as its finance chief and as a director with effect from 16th October 2026.

Last October current CFO Richard Boult informed the board of his intention to step down. He will leave at the end of October.