The British Business Bank has agreed a £75 million cornerstone commitment to SV Health Investors’ new flagship fund –  SV8 Biotech Fund LP – which is dedicated to multi-stage therapeutics.

It is the bank’s largest fund commitment to date and brings its total fund commitments to life sciences above half a billion, with £560m committed across 15 life science funds. 

These fund commitments have collectively leveraged £3.04 billion from private sector investors, bringing in six pounds for every one pound invested, it says. 

Welsh EdTech Learna has been acquired by Dutch firm Reducate in a multi-million-pound deal.

Learna was founded in Cardiff in 2010 and serves more than 1,500 active learners.

It delivers 100% online, modular, tutor-led programmes – postgraduate masters, diplomas and certificates – for doctors and healthcare professionals, designed around medical career progression.

Author: Alastair Winsey, founder of AIVA Revolution

Twenty minutes from order to delivery – that’s the new normal.  

Deliveroo brings dinner to your door faster than you can decide what to watch on Netflix. It’s an extraordinary level of speed and convenience, driven by tech giants with billion-dollar budgets that have completely rewritten how customers expect to be served.

For hospitality, that’s both the challenge and the opportunity. If the sector is going to stay relevant, venues must be more competitive, more forward-thinking, and far more connected to their guests than ever before.

And while hospitality provides a vivid example, this shift is rippling across every service-led sector, from retail to real estate, where relationships and responsiveness now define competitive advantage.

Because the truth is simple: younger generations won’t wait. Whether it’s a wedding, a restaurant booking, or a weekend escape, they expect instant answers. If they don’t get them, they move on, not tomorrow, but within minutes.

And even after they’ve left, the relationship shouldn’t end. Guests who’ve had a brilliant experience rarely return on their own. They’re waiting to be invited back, but most venues never follow up. I experienced this myself on a recent holiday. We had a fantastic stay, but there was no follow-up, no reminder, no reason to return. Another lost opportunity that the managing director probably never even knew existed.

That’s the real gap technology can close.

Because hospitality isn’t just about service anymore – it’s about nurture.

The FTSE 100 has pushed up slightly again so far today as it nears its all-time peak once again. 

Prudential (2.83%) is leading the FTSE 100 after confirming plans for an IPO for its Indian asset management joint venture ICICI Prudential Asset Management Company.

Vodafone (1.66%) ticked up as Barclays Capital it to “overweight” from “equal weight” and raised its price target to 120p from 100p on Monday.

Smith & Nephew (1.58%) and Rolls-Royce (1.43%) have also risen slightly. 

On the downside, Marks & Spencer (-2.21%) is one of the weakest FTSE 100 firms so far today, with housebuilders Barratt Redrow (-2.17%), Persimmon (-2.16%) and Berkeley (-1.83%) all also slipping. 

In the FTSE 250, Kainos (6.93%) topped the risers. The tech firm is now at its 2025 peak with a share price of 1,155p. 

Oxford Nanopore (5.13%) has spiked following the news that it has appointed Francis Van Parys as its next chief executive.

Trustpilot (4.65%), PayPoint (4.11%) and Baltic Classifieds (3.54%) are more FTSE 250 risers.

At the other end, SDCL Efficiency Income Trust (-17.49%) has dropped sharply after releasing its half-year results which showed ‘little improvement’ according to chair Tony Roper. 

Future (-5.13%) has fallen amid a tough period for the advertising industry, while Unite Group (-3.11%) and Rotork (-3.11%) are slightly lower today too.

Author: Patrick Killeen

ASOS has reported a drop in revenue in its latest annual results, but the online fashion retailer narrowed its losses as its turnaround plan continues to take effect.

The group’s revenue dropped from £2.9 billion last year to £2.5bn this year, with customers also falling from 19.7 million to 17m.

However, operating performance moved the right way, with the London-based firm posting an operating loss of £212m, a significant improvement on last year’s £332m.

The UK’s largest online pharmacy, is now the only online pharmacy in the UK to hold B Corp status in recognition of its commitment to social and environmental responsibility, transparency and accountability. 

Pharmacy2U, whose digital healthcare platform serves over 1.6 million patients, was able to meet rigorous standards across the areas of governance, workers, community, environment and customers.

It says the status reflects the company’s long-term commitment to balancing sustainable growth with responsibility to people and the planet.

LendInvest has posted another profitable half-year, making H1 FY26 its second consecutive period of profit as lending volumes rose.

New lending climbed 23% to £663.6 million, helping net operating income jump 29% to £21.5m, while adjusted EBITDA swung to a £3.7m gain and profit before tax reached £1.2m.

The company has said that its tech-enabled, capital-efficient model is now fully embedded and scaling without adding fixed overheads.

Looking ahead, it expects full-year performance to stay in line with market expectations despite a brief pre-Budget slowdown in property purchases.

London-listed Eagle Eye has landed a new three-year deal with a major regional US grocery chain covering more than 500 stores across nine states, starting with a six-month paid proof of concept.

The retailer will trial the company’s AI-driven Personalized Challenges and Personalized Promotion Ranking tools to improve one-to-one marketing, boost engagement and drive sales.

If rolled out to the wider customer base, the contract is expected to make a material contribution to EagleAI recurring revenue from the first half of FY27.

The win follows another multi-year North American food retail contract announced last month.

The Insolvency Service has appointed Duncan Beach as its new chief executive.

Beach joins from HSBC, where he was managing director and global head of risk and compliance transformation.

He replaces interim CEO Alec Pybus, who stepped in after former chief executive Dean Beale left the agency in May.

With more than two decades of strategic leadership experience, Beach brings a track record in driving large-scale change across complex organisations.

Evelyn Partners has appointed Victoria Gammon as a partner in financial planning, boosting its specialist advice offering from its Nottingham office.

A chartered and certified financial planner with more than 20 years’ experience, Gammon joins from IM Asset Management where she was an associate director.

She brings deep expertise in court of protection work and in advising clients receiving personal injury and clinical negligence settlements.

Her remit will cover clients across the Midlands and beyond, as Evelyn Partners continues to expand its regional financial planning capability.

Author: Patrick Killeen

Big Technologies plc has announced that it expects its annual performance to be in line with market expectations, after a hectic few months involving its founder and former chief executive.

The firm expects 2025 revenue to be in the range of £48.5 million to £49.5m.

The AIM-listed electronic monitoring specialist pointed to a string of fresh contract wins and a new US partnership that should start feeding into recurring revenue next year.

Today’s announcement comes after a hectic few months for the Rickmansworth-based firm.

It remains locked in a £320m High Court battle with founder Sara Murray OBE after her dismissal as CEO in March, with the company alleging document forgery linked to its 2021 IPO and other governance breaches – claims she has called “outrageous”.

Perplexity has struck a global partnership with Cristiano Ronaldo, with the footballing icon taking a strategic investment stake in the AI answer-engine company.

The California-based firm says Ronaldo uses the product as part of his preparation and decision-making, and the collaboration will help push the platform to a wider mainstream audience.

To launch the tie-up, Perplexity is rolling out a dedicated Cristiano Ronaldo hub featuring an interactive CR7 experience, including career timelines, curated questions and exclusive imagery for fans to explore.

Author: Patrick Killeen

Greengage & Co has set out plans to join the Access segment of the Aquis Stock Exchange Growth Market, aiming to scale its FinTech platform while launching a Bitcoin-backed yield strategy alongside the float.

Founded in 2018, the London-based company positions itself as a relationship-led bridge between traditional finance and digital assets.

The float is designed to fund what it calls a “Bitcoin Yield Reserve Strategy”.

Greengage said that this is different from passive corporate treasury Bitcoin holdings because it seeks yield on top of any potential price upside.

The plan is to purchase Bitcoin with IPO proceeds, then borrow against those holdings on a non-recourse basis and deploy the borrowed funds into high-yield private credit portfolios.

If Bitcoin appreciates, the business expects to keep that capital upside after loan repayment and if it falls sharply, the lender can liquidate the collateral but Greengage says it would have no liability beyond losing the pledged Bitcoin.

Author: Patrick Killeen

Oxford Nanopore Technologies has named Francis Van Parys as its next chief executive, replacing founder Gordon Sanghera who has led the FTSE 250 firm since its inception in 2005.

The London-listed company, which develops molecular sensing technology based on nanopores, said Van Parys will join the business and its board as an executive director on 2nd March 2026.

He arrives with more than two decades of senior leadership experience in life sciences and is currently president and CEO of Radiometer, the acute-care diagnostics specialist owned by Danaher.

Sanghera will remain with the group in an advisory role through to early 2027 to support an orderly handover.

Netflix has agreed a £54bn deal to take over Warner Bros’ film and TV studios.

The deal will commence once the latter’s Discovery Global division – which includes CNN and the TNT Sports – is separated.

As well as its high-profile film studio, Warner Bros’ portfolio includes HBO, the HBO Max streaming platform and DC Studios.

Paramount Skydance and Comcast were the rival bidders for Warner Bros. The former has made a complaint that Netflix was given preferential treatment during the bidding process.

The deal, not expected to close until late 2026 or 2027, is likely to be closely scrutinised by competition regulators in the United States and UK.

Author: Chris Maguire

Cloud giant Cloudflare has apologised for its lateness outage, which impacted more than a quarter of its customers.

The US-based tech firm revealed that its network first reported problems at 8.47am on Friday morning and resolved its services 25 minutes later at 9.12am.

LinkedIn, Zoom and Canva were among the websites to go down with users met by empty pages.

The latest problem came just two weeks after Cloudflare’s CEO Matthew Prince was forced to issue a public apology for letting the ‘internet down’ after its latest high profile crash.

A company spokesman said: “Any outage of our systems is unacceptable, and we know we have let the internet down again following the incident on November 18.

“We will be publishing details next week about the work we are doing to stop these types of incidents from occurring.”

Nithin Kamath, founder and CEO at Zerodha and Rainmatter, said: “Cloudflare powers approximately 20-25 per cent of all internet traffic globally.

“It’s the infrastructure behind millions of websites and apps—from content delivery and DDoS protection to DNS services.

“When Cloudflare has an outage, it doesn’t just affect one company; it impacts a significant chunk of the internet simultaneously.”

 

Zally CEO’s ‘regret’ over 11 previous business failures. Patrick Smith said he’s been completely ‘open’ about leaving a trail of unpaid creditors earlier in his career following several business failures.

£38m deal for Manchester United partner backed by Rio Ferdinand. Fast-growing Sokin, club’s official global business payment solutions partner, valued at $300m by Series B round.

Eddie Hearn’s Matchroom signs deal with Ten Percent Club. Firm, which was launched less than three years ago, becomes official supplement partner for firm in ‘surreal’ moment for founder.

LDC leads major funding deal for Gateshead’s Aspire. Private equity investor leads significant minority investment deal into expanding tech company targeting £100m revenue by 2030.

Stricken Versarien to appoint administrators. Time running out for graphene specialist after fellow listed company pulled out of £200,000 takeover deal at final hurdle.

KKR completes £4.7bn acquisition of Spectris. CEO of listed UK firm to be changed from start of 2026 as deal completes following US private equity bidding war.

FTSE 100 & 250: November in review. After a record-breaking October for the FTSE 100, BusinessCloud looks at which of the UK’s biggest stocks moved most in a hectic month.

Record year at Manchester’s On the Beach. Listed holidays booking platform reveals record total transaction value for fourth consecutive year as revenue and profits also jump.

8 startups funded by PXN’s PraeSeed programme. Early stage companies from Newcastle, Durham, Leeds, Manchester, Liverpool, Sheffield and Lancaster each win £200k backing.

A newly formed community initiative has launched to champion Nottingham’s tech ecosystem.

Built in Notts has been launched by Martin Sandhu alongside research which claims the city’s tech sector is significantly outperforming its level of public investment.

The ‘Potential vs Investment Index’ compares 20 UK cities across Innovate UK funding, startup creation and graduate outcomes. It found that Nottingham is outpacing many of its larger rivals but receives far less Innovate UK support per capita than other major tech hubs.

The city secured just £6.1 million in Innovate UK technology funding in 2024/25, equivalent to £19 per capita, compared with over £45m for York (£225 per capita) and £28m for Cambridge (£188 per capita).

However the city saw 170 new tech businesses formed in the last year, and continues to produce more than 2,000 engineering and technology graduates annually, providing a strong skills pipeline for its digital economy.

At an event last night at Oldknows Factory in Nottingham, local founder and investor Jordan Adams delivered a talk titled ‘The Great London Lie: How Regional Champions Win the Scale Game’.

Azoma, a company pioneering Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO) for eCommerce, has raised £3m in pre-Series A funding.

The platform helps major brands and retailers – including Mars, Colgate, HP, Reckitt, Beiersdorf, Canadian Tire and Zappos – increase their share of visibility in AI search.

The London startup was founded by former Amazon executive Max Sinclair and Timur Luguev, a PhD and postdoc in AI.

The round included Ignite Ventures, Rank Ventures, eBay Ventures x Techstars, Twinpath and MaRS IAF, as well as strategic angel investors such as the chairman & CEO of The Winn-Dixie Company, and senior leadership at Google DeepMind.

Construction tech provider Causeway Technologies has expanded further into Europe with the acquisition of LetsBuild Aproplan.

The Buckinghamshire firm said the deal extends its reach across Belgium, France, the Netherlands and Luxembourg.

This transaction represents the sixth strategic acquisition by Causeway since Five Arrows made a significant investment in Causeway in 2021. 

Causeway was founded in 1999 by chief executive Phil Brown. It now serves over 3,000 customers globally and has 500 employees.