Listed Brave Bison has promoted Ric Hayes to chief strategy officer.

After three years as group strategy director at SocialChain – the business it acquired in early 2023 – Hayes will be stepping up to join Brave Bison’s executive leadership team, taking charge of a newly centralised strategy function across the three of the company’s agency brands: Brave Bison, SocialChain and Engage Digital Partners.

He will lead a connected team, including Brave Bison Performance’s director of strategy Brenda Imeson and SocialChain’s strategy and innovation director Gareth Harrison, on a mission to work alongside clients to help them adapt to shifting media and tech dynamics and seize emerging opportunities.

He will also work closely with other strategic leaders across the wider Brave Bison business including founder of the MiniMBA Professor Mark Ritson and MTM’s Richard Ellis to build new solutions that encompass consultancy, training and execution.

Author: Jonathan Symcox

A HealthTech aiming to make next-day blood testing a mainstream health habit across the UK has secured fresh investment and appointed Gabby Logan as brand ambassador.

Sussex-headquartered One Day Tests has also opened a state-of-the-art laboratory headquarters in West Sussex.

The 60,000 sq ft facility significantly increases the company’s internal capacity to process hundreds of biomarkers, usually within hours of arrival at the laboratory. 

An AI-driven chemistry startup, SOLVE Chemistry, has raised £4 million seed funding to expand its work helping pharmaceutical and agrochemical manufacturers bring products to market faster, more sustainably, and at lower cost.

The significant time and expense needed to design a chemical production line prevent drugs and agrochemicals from quickly reaching the people who need them, and exposes manufacturers to the risk that market conditions could change while they wait.

To scale chemical production more quickly, SOLVE Chemistry, a spinout from Imperial College London, uses novel ultra-high-throughput data collection hardware at its London lab to obtain accurate data on chemical reactions 20x faster than traditional high throughput experimentation, and trains AI models to predict the best way to manufacture chemicals.

Author: Jonathan Symcox

Lawyer Victoria Morrison-Hughes has launched The Legal Lexi, a startup which helps law firms to ensure clients genuinely understand legal costs and retainer terms — not merely sign them.

As a costs lawyer who has worked closely with solicitors across a wide range of practice areas, Morrison-Hughes says she is acutely aware of the regulatory, commercial and practical pressures law firms operate under.

Developed in response to rising solicitor–client disputes, increasing Legal Ombudsman complaints and heightened regulatory scrutiny, The Legal Lexi addresses one of the profession’s most persistent risk areas: misunderstandings around fees, scope of service and informed consent.

Author: Jonathan Symcox

A couple have launched their third business together to tackle the UK ‘succession crisis’.

Emma Margetts and Scott Winship met at Investec Asset Management 15 years ago and have since spent the past decade building, scaling and selling businesses together.

The couple sold their first business Alpha Exchange, an investment research exchange for the capital markets community, to Visible Alpha – now S&P Global – and say ClearScore snapped up their second venture BetterCents, a digital debt manager.

Their latest business Emsco Partners has launched its fund to tackle a growing problem.

Rex Software has appointed Dr Liron Nehmadi as its chief product and technology officer to lead product, development and design across the entire group.

The London-based all-in-one estate agency platform announced the appointment following a series of new product launches, acquisitions and rebrand, which brought its expanding suite of technology products under a single identity.

Liron brings a wealth of experience in product and development, most recently holding the post of vice president at AI-driven risk intelligence and management platform, EverC.

Prior to this, he held a string of senior product positions at leading technology organisations, including three years as chief product officer at Catch of the Day, where he led product, development, UI, and analytics. During his tenure, the company scaled from AU$250m to AU$750m in revenue, culminating in its acquisition by Wesfarmers.

LUX has secured its first institutional investment, led by SFC Capital, as part of a £277.5k pre-seed raise.

The Oxfordshire business delivers on-site, on-demand hydrogen production, storage, and dispensing, addressing a key infrastructure challenge in the hydrogen sector by removing complex logistics and enabling practical deployment across transportation, manufacturing, and energy applications.

London-based FinTech Novum Investment Management has secured a significant equity investment from a UK local government pension fund to support the launch of Doris, an investment technology designed to tackle one of the biggest barriers to investing: fear of open-ended risk.

The backing supports Novum’s next phase of growth as Doris moves towards market within the FCA’s regulatory framework.

Novum says the model has also attracted backing from government and parliamentary figures, highlighting its wider relevance to UK growth and participation in investing.

Author: Jonathan Symcox

A London-headquartered digital sponsorship activation platform used by top Premier League clubs has been acquired.

WSC Sports, a sports content automation platform, has swooped for Partnerbrite, which enables brands to activate fan engagement through targeted campaigns. 

The acquisition expands WSC Sports’ platform with campaign execution and audience activation tools, allowing sponsorships to be planned, activated, and measured without sharing rightsholder fan data.

Tribal Group plc has reported a positive close to FY25, delivering revenue and adjusted EBITDA slightly ahead of the recently upwardly revised market expectations.

The provider of software and services to the international education market said ARR increased by 11% to £63.3m (FY24: £57m), driven by both new customer wins and upgrades.

It substantially improved its net cash position at 31st December 2025 at £11.4m, significantly ahead of current market forecasts (FY24: net debt of £3.2m), reflecting a considerable improvement in profitability, reduced capex requirements within the business, an exceptional working capital performance and a one-off advance customer payment of £3.2m.

It said the strong financial performance reflected healthy demand for Student Information Solutions, with key go-lives including University of Warwick, University of Wolverhampton and University of the Arts London.

Microlise Group plc says revenue for FY2025 is expected to be in-line with revised market expectations.

The provider of transport management software to fleet operators reported 16% underlying recurring revenue growth from direct customers and £5m of annualised cost savings executed.

Revenue for the year ending 31st December 2025 was £84 (FY2024: £81m), representing growth of 3.7%. Annual recurring revenue increased 4.6% to £59.1m (FY 2024: £56.6m).

The group’s net cash as of 31st December 2025 was ahead of revised expectations at £16.7m, up from £11.4m at 31st December 2024.

Author: Patrick Killeen

Turing Innovation Catalyst Manchester (TIC Manchester) has unveiled the first cohort of its new Startup Lab.

The incubator is designed to help early-stage AI founders turn technical ideas into commercial businesses rooted in Greater Manchester.

The three-month programme is aimed at academic entrepreneurs, technical builders and DeepTech founders at the very start of their journey, providing hands-on support to help AI-first ideas gain real-world traction.

The businesses taking part are AI assessment platform Running Paper; STEM education equity organisation ClickSafe Sentinel; solo traveller social network SoloBudd; PR specialists Unhooked Communications; video generation platform VideoZero; autonomous medical sterilisation system Smarterile; and polymer data platform PolymerFlow.

Author: Jonathan Symcox

A FinTech company backed early on by Manchester United legend Rio Ferdinand has secured a $100 million (£73m) long-term debt facility from Oxford Finance.

The profitable business payments company only announced a £38m Series B fundraise in December – led by Prysm Capital – which valued it at $300m.

Sokin was unveiled as United’s official global business payment solutions partner in August.

The new facility will accelerate Sokin’s expansion across North America, Asia, the Middle East and South America, and fast-track the acquisition of further regional licenses, banking partnerships and global infrastructure scaling.

Additionally, investments will fund the development and launch of new products, including embedded payments capabilities.

Author: Jonathan Symcox

Shares in FDM Group have recovered today after the IT-focused professional services provider reported its annual results.

The London-headquartered PLC said for the year to 31st December 2025 it expects financial performance to be within the range of market expectations.

Revenue is expected to be £178 million, down 31% in comparison to the prior year (2024: £258m).

Its share price is up 12% today (writing at 12pm), at 162 pence, giving it a market cap of £178m.

Shares remain down 17% over six months and 39% over the last 12 months.

The CFO of listed Cerillion is to step dow.

The billing, charging and customer relationship management software solutions provider said Andrew Dickson will leave the board on 1st March 2026 to pursue new opportunities.

He will remain at the company for a handover period with his successor, Greg Price, who will take up the role and join the board and the company by 1st May 2026. 

Price, aged 50 years, joins Cerillion from essensys plc, a global provider of software and technology for the flexible workspace industry.

He was previously CFO at Checkit plc, the provider of intelligent operations management software, and prior to that, CFO at CargoLogic Air.

Author: Jonathan Symcox

Shares are down at Card Factory plc today despite reporting revenue growth this morning.

The retailer said total group revenue for the 11 months ended 31st December 2025 of £541.6 million was up 7.3% year-on-year, supported by positive contributions from acquired businesses including Funky Pigeon.

Trading was in line with revised guidance it said, while it expects to deliver adjusted profit before tax for FY26 of between £55-60 million.

Broker Insights, a UK-based InsurTech that is transforming the way brokers place commercial insurance policies, says it has marked another first with the latest version of its platform.

The firm says its VISION platform now uses AI and data insights to help brokers identify businesses with gaps in product coverage – in particular cybersecurity or management liability insurance – and quickly quote and bind a policy.

The move will not only help brokers to increase revenue, it says, but could also increase uptake of cybersecurity insurance.

This currently stands at just 2.8% of businesses, according to Broker Insights’ figures.

PayPlan has strengthened its leadership team with the appointment of a new chairman and three senior industry executives.

Founded in 1992 and led by chief executive Rachel Duffey, PayPlan is one of the UK’s leading providers of free-to-consumer debt advice and tailored payment plan solutions.

Each year, the organisation helps hundreds of thousands of people to improve their financial wellbeing with confidential, FCA-regulated advice.

PayPlan has received strategic investment from Palladian Investment Partners, which will be used to accelerate the rollout of enhanced digital debt advice services.

Mark  Arnold, formerly Barclays UK’s Head of Savings and Mortgages has been appointed as its new chairman.

It has also appointed Jaco Wilsenach as COO, Tim Richardson as CTO and Paul Giggins as operational strategy director.

Litestream Ventures saw $78m in non-binding investor pledges during the World Economic Forum for companies helping to solve the world’s biggest challenges.

The firm also debuted its pledge-based signalling technology at its forum, delivered through a private app used by attending investors.

The closed-door Litestream forum brought together more than 120 investors, founders and funds, and a charitable partner — Star for Life. During the session, investors in the room signalled $78.1 million in non-binding pledges in support of 12 participating companies and the charitable initiative.

Manchester-based ProDataStack is looking to change how professional athletes understand, evidence and negotiate their value, with a data and analytics platform built specifically for elite sport.

Founded in 2022 by data specialist and author Fiona Green, the business was sparked by Kevin De Bruyne’s data-led contract negotiations at Manchester City.

The moment highlighted how few athletes had access to the kind of insight needed to truly understand their market worth and ProDataStack was created to close that gap.

Backed by GM Business Growth Hub’s Innovation Service, the company has developed a centralised platform that brings together six performance, digital and market datasets into a single, accessible dashboard.

The result is a clear, evidence-based view of an athlete’s value, designed for use by players, agents and teams alike.

The platform is already being used by Team Scotland in preparation for the 2026 Commonwealth Games, as well as by agents representing elite athletes including Premier League defender Rúben Dias and Manchester United Women’s Jayde Riviere.