Newsletter: VC Breakfast Club

/deals

Sava (London, biosensors) - wearable‑tech startup Sava raised $19M Series A led by Balderton Capital and Pentland Ventures with Norrsken VC, JamJar, True and others. Cofounders Renato Circi and Rafaël Michali are scaling their modular biosensor platform for real‑time multi‑biomarker health monitoring.

Ultromics (Oxford, cardiology AI) - AI diagnostics spinout Ultromics scored $55M Series C co‑led by Legal & General, Allegis Capital and Lightrock, with Oxford Science Enterprises, GV, Blue Venture Fund and university‑affiliated investors participating. Founder Ross Upton will expand its EchoGo platform for heart‑failure diagnosis.

Unmind (London, mental‑health) - Unmind, the workplace mental‑health platform used by 2.5M employees, pulled in $35M Series C. New investor TELUS Global Ventures joined Project A, Felix Capital and Sapphire Ventures. CEO Dr Nick Taylor aims to scale Unmind’s AI‑powered proactive care and therapy services.

Jitty (London, proptech) - AI property‑search startup Jitty raised $3.8M seed led by REA Group with Goodwater Ventures, Gradient Ventures, True Global and angels. Founders Graham Paterson and Daniel Cooper are former Deliveroo/Wise engineers; their platform uses large‑language models and computer vision to deliver image‑first home‑search and expand UK coverage.

Novee AI (London, insurtech) - Novee AI closed a £1.6M pre‑seed round led by 42CAP and Insurtech Gateway. Founders Haris Khan and Arved Pohlabeln are building an intelligence layer for commercial and specialty insurance underwriters; funds will accelerate product development and open new insurance classes.

Due (London, fintech) - Cross‑border payments startup Due extended its seed round by £3M (total £5.5M) in a raise led by Speedinvest. Revolut alumnus Robert Sargsian is launching a stablecoin API that settles payments across fiat and crypto rails in real time.

Productive Machines (Sheffield, manufacturing) - AMRC spin‑out Productive Machines secured £510K via a convertible loan note led by Digital Catapult with Innovate UK backing. Its SenseNC software uses AI to optimise milling operations for CNC machine tools; the cash will expand the customer base.

TaskMaster Resources (Leeds, workforce) - Workforce solutions provider TaskMaster Resources clinched a £15M package from Bibby Financial Services, including a £13M invoice‑discounting facility and a £2M cash‑flow loan. The nearly three‑decade‑old agency will fund acquisitions and national expansion towards a £100M revenue goal.

JECO (Huddersfield, automation) - Game‑dev automation startup JECO netted £960K, the first deal through the British Business Bank’s new co‑investment platform. Games Angels led the round. Funding will fuel development of its automation tools for video‑game studios and digital creatives.

/spotlight

Structured AI (London, engineering AI) - Oxford grads Raymond Zhao, Brandon Smith and Isabel Greenslade raised €435K pre‑seed from Zero Prime Ventures, Airtree Ventures and Oxford Seed Fund. Structured AI is building vertical AI agents that automate repetitive design‑engineering workflows.

/funds

• Brighton Park Capital sets up London base - US investment firm Brighton Park Capital opened a London office as its EMEA HQ. Managing roughly $2.1B and already backing UK firms like Orca AI and PortSwigger, it plans to invest in AI‑enabled software across Europe.

/tech

• TBI calls for AI infrastructure overhaul - A report from the Tony Blair Institute warned that the UK holds only 3% of global AI compute capacity versus the US’s 75%. It urges upgrades to datacentres, the energy grid and planning rules, calling this a “now‑or‑never” moment for the UK’s AI competitiveness.

• OpenAI’s Stargate Norway project - London hyperscaler Nscale was tapped by OpenAI to build Stargate Norway, a 230 MW renewable‑powered AI datacentre with energy group Aker. The facility, which could scale to 520 MW, will supply compute to European developers and serve UK/Nordic customers.

/flywheel

• Cambridge Innovation Capital’s £100M commitment - CIC launched a £100M initiative to invest in University of Cambridge spinouts via its new £250M venture fund, adding an Entrepreneur‑in‑Residence programme to help deep‑tech companies scale and commercialise their research.

• Science Creates accelerator - Bristol’s Science Creates engineering‑biology accelerator opened applications for its third cohort. The equity‑free, government‑funded programme pays participants and has helped 35 startups raise over £6M and create 89 jobs.

• Techscaler partners with Ventures Lab - Scotland’s government‑backed Techscaler accelerator joined forces with The Ventures Lab to support up to 40 impact‑led startups. The partnership will run joint programmes to make social and environmental ventures investment‑ready.

/breakfast

• Will AI kill the venture capitalist (part 1 - end of the apprentice model)

• Will AI kill the venture capitalist (part 2 - VCs become PEs)

📸 /techbrunch

Every week I use AI to reimagine a TechCrunch story from the week.

This week, YC releases it’s themes for the upcoming batch. I imagine a meta venture to defeat them all - the Cursor for building Cursors.

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