EXCLUSIVE: Monzo, the digital lender which has become one of Britain's biggest consumer banks, is in talks about a sale to Brazil's Nu Holdings which could value it at between £8bn and £10bn, ending the prospect of a near-term IPO of a UK fintech champion. news.sky.com/story/digital-b…

For 13 years, the UK has regulated alternative investment funds, including venture capital, with a view to protecting investors — without exceptions for strategy. The result is that failure has become more costly, barriers to entry are higher, and failure no less common. This is a systematic drag on the UK venture industry, which we would like to see corrected. Consider the debut funds of many legendary firms, and how many were in the $5–10M "micro VC" range. Indeed, @seedcamp's Fund I was just €2.5M, and their Fund II just €5.2M; they are now one of the most important early-stage firms in Europe. That small initial scale is what allowed LPs to test their ability without putting too much at risk; the power of cheap experiments with huge upside. It also enables a broader distribution of capital; casting a wider net. Today, micro VC is effectively prohibited in the UK, because of the cost imposed by regulation. For example, admin and compliance would consume about 20% of a £5M fund, and about 11% of a £10M fund — versus 3.5–6% for a US equivalent. This cost raises the hurdle for viable fund size, concentrating capital into fewer firms with a broadly lower risk appetite and weaker coverage. It is a structural leakage of value. The ironic result of legislation intended to protect investors. However, there is a solution: The Exempt Reporting Adviser regime was desgined precisely to eliminate this burden in the US, and that ecosystem has since benefitted from a fertile market for small and emerging managers — broadly outperforming their established peers. Applying a similar concept to the UK would be straightforward, essentially cost-free, and actually improve the regulator's view of the market. This is the basic outline of our proposal, as a response to the current AIFM consultations. We have prepared a policy document and an open letter, signed by organisations across the industry, including: - @join_ef - @formventureshq - @Mountside_V - @Beauhurst - @isomercapital - @AntlerGlobal - @seedcamp - @MozillaVentures - @joinsequel - ...and many more. If the UK is to meet the stated goal of "growth in every postcode", or growth in ANY postcode, it is vital that opportunities like this (sensible deregulation to boost growth) are seized. Read more here: blog.joinodin.com/p/reformin… Sign the letter: aifm.joinodin.com/

For 13 years, the UK has regulated alternative investment funds, including venture capital, with a view to protecting investors — without exceptions for strategy. The result is that failure has become more costly, barriers to entry are higher, and failure no less common. This is a systematic drag on the UK venture industry, which we would like to see corrected. Consider the debut funds of many legendary firms, and how many were in the $5–10M "micro VC" range. Indeed, @seedcamp's Fund I was just €2.5M, and their Fund II just €5.2M; they are now one of the most important early-stage firms in Europe. That small initial scale is what allowed LPs to test their ability without putting too much at risk; the power of cheap experiments with huge upside. It also enables a broader distribution of capital; casting a wider net. Today, micro VC is effectively prohibited in the UK, because of the cost imposed by regulation. For example, admin and compliance would consume about 20% of a £5M fund, and about 11% of a £10M fund — versus 3.5–6% for a US equivalent. This cost raises the hurdle for viable fund size, concentrating capital into fewer firms with a broadly lower risk appetite and weaker coverage. It is a structural leakage of value. The ironic result of legislation intended to protect investors. However, there is a solution: The Exempt Reporting Adviser regime was desgined precisely to eliminate this burden in the US, and that ecosystem has since benefitted from a fertile market for small and emerging managers — broadly outperforming their established peers. Applying a similar concept to the UK would be straightforward, essentially cost-free, and actually improve the regulator's view of the market. This is the basic outline of our proposal, as a response to the current AIFM consultations. We have prepared a policy document and an open letter, signed by organisations across the industry, including: - @join_ef - @formventureshq - @Mountside_V - @Beauhurst - @isomercapital - @AntlerGlobal - @seedcamp - @MozillaVentures - @joinsequel - ...and many more. If the UK is to meet the stated goal of "growth in every postcode", or growth in ANY postcode, it is vital that opportunities like this (sensible deregulation to boost growth) are seized. Read more here: blog.joinodin.com/p/reformin… Sign the letter: aifm.joinodin.com/

If Monzo does get acquired early crowdfunders will make over 50x. In 2016 Monzo offered Crowdcube investors the opportunity to buy up to 3% of the business at a £29m valuation. At a £6bn valuation they were sitting on a 40x returns. At £8-10bn it could be as high as 65x. NOT BAD

Every year @BritishProgress asks Britain's top economists and policy researchers what the UK should do to increase growth. 🚨 As covered exclusively for @thetimes this morning, the 2026 growth survey results are now in! 🚨 This was our biggest survey yet with over 100 responses. 📉 The bad news: Britain's public finances, with inflation hit by external shocks, are in a bad state. 📈 The good news: the UK is not without options. There is much that can be done on the supply side reforms, & smarter fiscal policy can raise revenue while supporting growth. Here are the 12 most interesting results 👇 *1. Where should the government prioritise spending political capital?* We asked "In what areas should the Government invest more (or less) political capital to achieve growth?" NB this was explicitly not a question about spending – that's the next one.

This is huge. Potential sale of Monzo to NuBank in the region of £8-10bn. This would be amazing for early investors, employees and crowdfunders. It would provide some MUCH needed liquidity. However it would also be another example of a great UK tech company being scooped up by a foreign giant. However, without a functioning local capital market there is no alternative.

This is huge. Potential sale of Monzo to NuBank in the region of £8-10bn. This would be amazing for early investors, employees and crowdfunders. It would provide some MUCH needed liquidity. However it would also be another example of a great UK tech company being scooped up by a foreign giant. However, without a functioning local capital market there is no alternative.

White House asks OpenAI and Anthropic to hold new models from UK testers until US review dlvr.it/TVdLK2

The most valuable hour you can spend on your health. Neko Health is now open in NYC.

Another week, another robotics map! 🇬🇧 This time, we will take a closer look at the busy streets of London and see what robotics companies are located there. London has excellent engineers and researchers, especially from universities like Imperial College London and UCL, which are well known for robotics, AI, and engineering. Many robotics founders and early employees come directly from these universities. London is home to Google DeepMind, one of the world’s leading AI labs. Its work on robot learning, control, and general AI has helped push forward how robots learn and adapt in the real world. The city also has one of Europe’s strongest investor ecosystems. 💰 London is a major global finance hub, so it’s easier to find venture capital, corporate investors, and early customers, especially for robotics companies working in areas like logistics, healthcare, and automation. It is very international and business-friendly. It’s easy to hire talent from around the world, set up a company, and sell globally. Of course, not mentioning that it is becoming the European hub when it comes to frontier AI labs! 👀 In the comments I'll post the companies from the ecosystem. ‼️ Note that London area has maaany more robotics companies, research labs, and innovation hubs, so this is a curated selection of the notable product companies, not an exhaustive census! P.S. I'm constantly working on improving these maps, so if your company is missing, please DM me with basic info about the co, and I will include it in the next release. ~~ ♻️ Join the weekly robotics newsletter, and never miss any news → ziegler.substack.com

A lot of the companies garnering the most funding heat rn are all converging on the ‘unknowable value / infinity dollars’ angle - Quantum computers? infinity dollars - Humanoid robotics? infinity dollars - Inference? somehow also yes ♾️💰 Tough time to be quantifiable.

A UK startup has just raised $140m to design new medicines with AI. The London startup is founded by @glen_gowers and Oliver Vince, and just announced their $140m Series C led by S32, with NVIDIA and Anthropic joining as new investors as well. Basecamp Research is teaching AI to understand biology collected from genetic data all over the world to design new medicines for diseases. I spoke to Oliver on the Scaling Europe show about the raise and finding cures with the help of AI. Timestamps: 0:00 Introduction 0:21 What Basecamp Research does 1:17 The new $140m Series C 1:57 The Eden models and the Trillion Gene Atlas 4:13 Why NVIDIA and Anthropic invested 5:35 Why they want investors who are realistic and optimistic 7:56 Which diseases it could help first 10:10 How close they are to treating patients 14:03 Drug company or pharma partner 15:19 A different approach from other AI biology companies 19:46 What could make it fail 21:42 Scepticism from traditional pharm