A specialist AI tech fund has chosen a pet health subscription startup for its first investment.
Manchester-based EHE Ventures has made a ‘significant’ six-figure investment via its AI Growth Fund into London AI-powered startup Scooch.
Scooch describes itself as an all-in-one subscription service designed to take the hassle out of pet healthcare.
EHE Venture Studio, made up of EHE Ventures and The Startup Factory, was founded in 2024 to support companies that are either AI-first or AI-enabled and plans to invest up to £5m this year exclusively in high-growth and early-stage AI companies via the fund.
News of the debut investment has coincided with the appointment of Neil Vose as the first CEO of EHE Venture Studio.
Vose said: “We’re really excited by this investment into Scooch and expect to announce three to four other deals in the coming weeks.
“We’re different to other investors because we don’t just provide funding. As a Venture Studio, we can also advise and build the tech through our engineering arm, known to many as The Startup Factory.
“We’re building and investing in the tech that will define the next generation.
“We were really impressed by the quality of Scooch’s management team, which is why we chose to invest in them.
“Scooch is using an AI co-pilot to effectively build a data-driven tech health marketplace and we think it can become a really big player in the market.
Neil Vose, CEO, EHE Venture Studio
“Scooch is our first, and currently, only planned direct-to-consumer investment. Most of them will be B2B.”
EHE Venture Studio, via the fund, intends to raise a total of £15m to focus on nurturing UK-based entrepreneurs at the pre-seed, seed, and Series A stages.
Vose, who has a background in commercialising technology and digital transformation, said: “A lot of founders can’t get the investment or the tech help needed to get an MVP to market. We can help with all of that.”
Baris Ozaydinli (pictured), founder and CEO of award-winning Scooch, said: “We are delighted to be partnering with EHE as it is a fund founded by inspirational exited founders who know how difficult it is to be a founder and there is also an expert team supporting the companies.
“We are on a mission to take the guesswork out of pet care with a vision to be the go-to pet health platform for the modern pet parent.
“We are going to use the investment for launching our brand new embedded pet insurance, Scooch Protect and AI-powered mobile app, Scooch Health.”
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EHE Venture Studio forms part of the wider EHE Group, which was founded by serial entrepreneurs Guy Remond, founder and former CEO of Cake Solutions, and Gary Fletcher, founder of Forest Holidays.
EHE Venture Studio recently teamed up with venture capital firm, Praetura Ventures, to create an online platform called Founder Hub to help early-stage entrepreneurs in the North of England access scaling skills and navigate the startup ecosystem.