Swedish fintech giant Klarna and UK payments fintech Zilch have today launched new membership packages, as they look to take on incumbent credit card firms and lock in customers with perks. Klarna has revamped its paid membership offerings, saying it was bringing “US-style credit card benefits to Europe". Klarna is best known as a BNPL provider but has shifted to everyday payments and is repositioning itself as an everyday bank. It says its membership revamp sees it remove fees, offer cashback on all purchases, and add new perks and subscriptions. Its four membership packages range from €4.99 a month, Klarna Everywhere, to €44.99 a month, which is called Klarna Max. Klarna Max offers 23 subscriptions, including to NordVPN and The New York Times, and a premium rose gold metal card. Klarna Max membership is now cheaper than AmEx Platinum, which costs around €760 a year, Klarna pointed out. Klarna is selling the flexibility of its memberships, saying that users can upgrade between months, unlike credit cards which tie users in for a year. The new membership plans are rolling out in Europe in the coming weeks. Meanwhile, Zilch, the London fintech credit and debit provider, is also today rolling out new membership packages, its first paid memberships. Zilch, which has over 5m customers, has launched Zilch Extra, £2.99 a month, which offers rewards and open banking income verification, and Zilch Plus, which costs £3.99 a month and offers higher rewards on debit purchases and a free Zilch physical card. Philip Belamant, CEO and co-founder of Zilch, said: “We started Zilch to eliminate the high cost of consumer credit. Our new membership tiers are the evolution of that mission, illustrating how Zilch is becoming the smart way to spend, where every purchase is intelligently financed, optimised and rewarded in real time."

According to Tech.eu’s H1 2026 report, Germany ranked as Europe’s second-largest technology funding market, with companies raising €6.3 billion across 267 deals. Investment was concentrated in several key sectors, with robotics, fintech, security, AI and software accounting for a significant share of total funding. Robotics led the market, driven by Neura Robotics’ €1.2 billion Series C, alongside funding for Quantum Systems, Sereact and RobCo. Fintech was another major contributor, supported by Cloover’s €1.0 billion debt financing and rounds for Upvest, Midas and Flagright. Security also attracted substantial investment, led by Stark’s €500 million raise and additional activity across defence and cybersecurity. Series C and debt financing accounted for the largest share of capital by funding stage, reflecting the impact of large rounds for more mature and capital-intensive companies. At the same time, early-stage activity remained broad, with companies across AI, software, healthtech, deeptech and energy securing funding, albeit through generally smaller rounds. Overall, Germany’s H1 2026 funding landscape was shaped by several large investments, particularly in robotics, defence and fintech, alongside a diverse pipeline of earlier-stage companies across the wider technology ecosystem. For further insights into funding trends across the European technology ecosystem, check out Tech.eu's Funding Explorer, free and open to everyone. Here are the ten companies that raised the most in H1 2026. Amount raised in H1 2026: $1.4B NEURA Robotics is a robotics company developing cognitive robots and physical AI systems designed to perceive, learn and interact with people and their surroundings. Its portfolio spans collaborative industrial robots, intelligent assistants and humanoid robots, supported by the Neuraverse platform, which brings together AI, sensors, robotics and real-world learning infrastructure. In H1 2026, NEURA announced up to $1.4 billion in Series C funding to expand production and accelerate the global rollout of its real-world training infrastructure for cognitive robots and physical AI. Amount raised in H1 2026: $1.2B Cloover provides a software and financing platform for decentralised energy projects, connecting installers, manufacturers, households and investors within a single operating environment. Its platform combines workflow management, financing, procurement and energy optimisation, using AI to automate processes and support credit underwriting and financial management. In H1 2026, the company secured more than $1.2 billion, with the capital supporting financing for customers and installers, expansion into additional European markets and further development of its AI-powered platform. Amount raised in H1 2026: €500M STARK is a defence technology company developing software-defined unmanned systems for European and NATO defence applications. Its technology includes autonomous aerial systems and command-and-control software, with products designed for rapid deployment and operation in contested environments. The company raised €500 million in H1 2026, with more than 80 per cent of the funding allocated to research and development and manufacturing, including new electronic warfare research facilities, increased production capacity and the development of sovereign defence technologies. Amount raised in H1 2026: $350M Parloa develops an AI Agent Management Platform for enterprise customer service, enabling companies to design, test, deploy and manage AI agents across voice and digital channels. The platform integrates with existing customer service, CRM and enterprise systems and is designed to automate high-volume customer interactions across different languages and use cases. A $350 million Series D raised in H1 2026 will support Parloa's international expansion, particularly across the US and Europe, as the company scales its AI customer service technology. Amount raised in H1 2026: €270M Isar Aerospace is a space technology company developing launch services for small and medium-sized satellites and constellations. Its two-stage Spectrum launch vehicle is designed and manufactured in-house, with the company building the production and launch infrastructure needed to provide commercial and institutional customers with access to orbit. Isar Aerospace closed a €270 million Series D in H1 2026 to expand its international operations, increase serial production of Spectrum and develop its launch infrastructure as it moves towards larger-scale commercial operations. Amount raised in H1 2026: $240M Focused Energy is a fusion energy company developing direct-drive laser fusion technology with the aim of generating energy from nuclear fusion at commercial scale. The company is working to move laser fusion from scientific research towards industrial deployment, including plans for a fusion facility at the former Biblis nuclear power plant site in Germany. In H1 2026, Focused Energy raised $240 million in Series A funding to advance its technology, develop fusion systems at Biblis and build the supply chains required for future commercial deployment. Amount raised in H1 2026: €150M Quantum Systems develops AI-powered unmanned aerial systems for defence, security and commercial applications. Its electric vertical take-off and landing drones combine aerial intelligence, sensors and software to support applications including reconnaissance, surveillance and mapping, with a growing focus on defence and dual-use markets. A €150 million European financing package secured in H1 2026 is intended to support the company's continued growth and industrial scaling of its unmanned technologies in Europe. Amount raised in H1 2026: €140M FINN is a mobility company offering car subscriptions as an alternative to vehicle ownership and traditional leasing. Through its digital platform, customers can subscribe to vehicles for a fixed monthly payment covering services such as registration, maintenance and insurance, while the company increasingly focuses its fleet on electric vehicles. In H1 2026, FINN secured €140 million in financing to fund its next phase of growth, including investment in its vehicle fleet, technology platform and operational infrastructure. Amount raised in H1 2026: $125M Upvest is a fintech infrastructure company providing banks, brokers, wealth managers and fintechs with API-based technology for building and operating investment products. Its platform covers trading, custody and back-office processes, allowing financial institutions to offer products such as stocks, ETFs, savings plans and fractional investments while managing the underlying regulatory and operational infrastructure. The company announced $125 million in financing in H1 2026 to further develop its platform, support the rollout of localised pension products and AI-driven investment services, and strengthen its offering across Europe and the UK. Amount raised in H1 2026: $110M Taktile develops an AI-powered decision platform for banks, insurers and other financial institutions, helping them automate and manage high-stakes processes such as credit underwriting, customer onboarding, claims assessment and financial crime investigations. Its technology combines decision infrastructure with AI agents to automate workflows that have traditionally required significant manual review. Taktile raised $110 million in Series C funding in H1 2026 to scale its platform and accelerate the adoption of AI across financial services, including further expansion in international markets.

According to Tech.eu’s H1 2026 report, Germany ranked as Europe’s second-largest technology funding market, with companies raising €6.3 billion across 267 deals. Investment was concentrated in several key sectors, with robotics, fintech, security, AI and software accounting for a significant share of total funding. Robotics led the market, driven by Neura Robotics’ €1.2 billion Series C, alongside funding for Quantum Systems, Sereact and RobCo. Fintech was another major contributor, supported by Cloover’s €1.0 billion debt financing and rounds for Upvest, Midas and Flagright. Security also attracted substantial investment, led by Stark’s €500 million raise and additional activity across defence and cybersecurity. Series C and debt financing accounted for the largest share of capital by funding stage, reflecting the impact of large rounds for more mature and capital-intensive companies. At the same time, early-stage activity remained broad, with companies across AI, software, healthtech, deeptech and energy securing funding, albeit through generally smaller rounds. Overall, Germany’s H1 2026 funding landscape was shaped by several large investments, particularly in robotics, defence and fintech, alongside a diverse pipeline of earlier-stage companies across the wider technology ecosystem. For further insights into funding trends across the European technology ecosystem, check out Tech.eu's Funding Explorer, free and open to everyone. Here are the ten companies that raised the most in H1 2026. Amount raised in H1 2026: $1.4B NEURA Robotics is a robotics company developing cognitive robots and physical AI systems designed to perceive, learn and interact with people and their surroundings. Its portfolio spans collaborative industrial robots, intelligent assistants and humanoid robots, supported by the Neuraverse platform, which brings together AI, sensors, robotics and real-world learning infrastructure. In H1 2026, NEURA announced up to $1.4 billion in Series C funding to expand production and accelerate the global rollout of its real-world training infrastructure for cognitive robots and physical AI. Amount raised in H1 2026: $1.2B Cloover provides a software and financing platform for decentralised energy projects, connecting installers, manufacturers, households and investors within a single operating environment. Its platform combines workflow management, financing, procurement and energy optimisation, using AI to automate processes and support credit underwriting and financial management. In H1 2026, the company secured more than $1.2 billion, with the capital supporting financing for customers and installers, expansion into additional European markets and further development of its AI-powered platform. Amount raised in H1 2026: €500M STARK is a defence technology company developing software-defined unmanned systems for European and NATO defence applications. Its technology includes autonomous aerial systems and command-and-control software, with products designed for rapid deployment and operation in contested environments. The company raised €500 million in H1 2026, with more than 80 per cent of the funding allocated to research and development and manufacturing, including new electronic warfare research facilities, increased production capacity and the development of sovereign defence technologies. Amount raised in H1 2026: $350M Parloa develops an AI Agent Management Platform for enterprise customer service, enabling companies to design, test, deploy and manage AI agents across voice and digital channels. The platform integrates with existing customer service, CRM and enterprise systems and is designed to automate high-volume customer interactions across different languages and use cases. A $350 million Series D raised in H1 2026 will support Parloa's international expansion, particularly across the US and Europe, as the company scales its AI customer service technology. Amount raised in H1 2026: €270M Isar Aerospace is a space technology company developing launch services for small and medium-sized satellites and constellations. Its two-stage Spectrum launch vehicle is designed and manufactured in-house, with the company building the production and launch infrastructure needed to provide commercial and institutional customers with access to orbit. Isar Aerospace closed a €270 million Series D in H1 2026 to expand its international operations, increase serial production of Spectrum and develop its launch infrastructure as it moves towards larger-scale commercial operations. Amount raised in H1 2026: $240M Focused Energy is a fusion energy company developing direct-drive laser fusion technology with the aim of generating energy from nuclear fusion at commercial scale. The company is working to move laser fusion from scientific research towards industrial deployment, including plans for a fusion facility at the former Biblis nuclear power plant site in Germany. In H1 2026, Focused Energy raised $240 million in Series A funding to advance its technology, develop fusion systems at Biblis and build the supply chains required for future commercial deployment. Amount raised in H1 2026: €150M Quantum Systems develops AI-powered unmanned aerial systems for defence, security and commercial applications. Its electric vertical take-off and landing drones combine aerial intelligence, sensors and software to support applications including reconnaissance, surveillance and mapping, with a growing focus on defence and dual-use markets. A €150 million European financing package secured in H1 2026 is intended to support the company's continued growth and industrial scaling of its unmanned technologies in Europe. Amount raised in H1 2026: €140M FINN is a mobility company offering car subscriptions as an alternative to vehicle ownership and traditional leasing. Through its digital platform, customers can subscribe to vehicles for a fixed monthly payment covering services such as registration, maintenance and insurance, while the company increasingly focuses its fleet on electric vehicles. In H1 2026, FINN secured €140 million in financing to fund its next phase of growth, including investment in its vehicle fleet, technology platform and operational infrastructure. Amount raised in H1 2026: $125M Upvest is a fintech infrastructure company providing banks, brokers, wealth managers and fintechs with API-based technology for building and operating investment products. Its platform covers trading, custody and back-office processes, allowing financial institutions to offer products such as stocks, ETFs, savings plans and fractional investments while managing the underlying regulatory and operational infrastructure. The company announced $125 million in financing in H1 2026 to further develop its platform, support the rollout of localised pension products and AI-driven investment services, and strengthen its offering across Europe and the UK. Amount raised in H1 2026: $110M Taktile develops an AI-powered decision platform for banks, insurers and other financial institutions, helping them automate and manage high-stakes processes such as credit underwriting, customer onboarding, claims assessment and financial crime investigations. Its technology combines decision infrastructure with AI agents to automate workflows that have traditionally required significant manual review. Taktile raised $110 million in Series C funding in H1 2026 to scale its platform and accelerate the adoption of AI across financial services, including further expansion in international markets.

The EU Industrial Accelerator Act (IAA), proposed by the European Commission in March, aims to ensure Europe manufactures more of the technologies and industrial products it consumes. Europe has historically been good at funding R&D and early-stage deep tech, but less successful at creating domestic markets for the resulting technologies. The IAA attempts to address the demand side through measures including public procurement. But if "Made in EU" requirements are to strengthen European industrial sovereignty, how far upstream should they extend? Christina Rebel is the CEO of CAD ROOMS, a female-founded engineering collaboration platform running on EU-hosted infrastructure and built specifically for distributed hardware engineering teams. CAD ROOMS is a cloud-based product data management and collaboration platform that allows engineering teams to manage, review, and securely share CAD files across different design tools without replacing the CAD software they already use. Rebel contends that the IAA is a bigger deal for engineering teams than most people are realising. “If ‘made in EU’ becomes a condition of public procurement, the conversation can’t stop at the product rolling off the line.  It has to start much earlier — at the tools your team uses to design it, version it, and collaborate on it.” Right now, most engineering teams are running their entire product development process through US-hosted platforms. Every CAD file, every revision, every piece of IP lives on infrastructure outside EU jurisdiction. That’s a problem that a procurement label on the finished product doesn’t fix. From open-source hardware to CAD ROOMS Rebel has over a decade of experience in cloud engineering collaboration, digital manufacturing, CAD data management, and distributed product development. Rebel is both Spanish and Dutch and grew up internationally, including in China where she saw the internationalisation of production first-hand.  Following study in politics and economics at university, she spent time helping others build startups, from idea generation to business-model development. At the same time, the maker movement was emerging. She recalled: “I was fascinated by the way people were starting to share hardware designs in the way software developers shared code: building on the shoulders of giants, remixing things, and learning from one another.” From this, Wikifactory emerged in 2016, essentially a cloud collaboration and product-data platform for hardware engineering and manufacturing like GitHub, a CAD collaboration tool, and a manufacturing platform, but built specifically for people designing physical products. The community grew to around 150,000 engineers around the world, and served much of the Fab Lab and makerspace ecosystem.  However, Rebel admitted that the team realised the model was difficult to scale sustainably. The team had spent about two years trying to work out how to marry open-source and private collaboration in hardware and engineering, “Ultimately we realised you can't really marry those two contexts. For commercial customers, the possibility that their IP could be disclosed was obviously a huge concern.”   At the same time, she was hearing more and more from professional engineers that what they really needed was the private product data management and collaboration side of what they'd built. The team separated its fully private product into a completely different environment and founded CAD Rooms. The product is end-to-end encrypted, both in transit and at rest, and the company subsequently achieved ISO certification. Engineering software is still stuck in the 1990s Rebel contends that engineers are probably one of the professional groups that have been least well served by modern software.  She asserts that engineers are still collaborating like it's the 1990s.  “You're talking about siloed, bureaucratic and rigid systems, and they need modern collaboration tools.” One of the biggest issues is that industrial companies don't necessarily use a single CAD tool. They might be using PTC Creo alongside SOLIDWORKS, or SOLIDWORKS alongside CATIA, or another combination. And they’re not necessarily going to buy and implement a vendor-specific Product Data Management system for every CAD tool they use. These systems can be expensive, and implementation can take a long time. Instead, they need something simpler and interoperable that works regardless of which CAD system you're using. CAD Rooms also wants to bring down the barriers to collaboration: “You shouldn't necessarily need to have CAD software installed simply to participate in a design review. You should be able to measure, review and collaborate professionally around the design in a secure environment.” Further, today’s software needs to accommodate  Mechanical engineers increasingly need to work alongside electronic engineers, for example, who may be using much more modern tools such as Altium, which is already cloud-based. When legacy mechanical engineering tools don't work effectively with those systems, information starts falling through the cracks. The same applies to simulation. Incredibly powerful simulation tools are emerging, creating opportunities for new companies to enter areas such as satellites and aerospace. Rebel asserts that Europe has amazing industrial clusters, so new players genuinely have a chance. But they're not necessarily taking full advantage of those newer tools because their legacy systems don't interoperate seamlessly with them. The wrong part gets sent to the manufacturer. Somebody overrides somebody else's work. People spend a day trying to work out which version they're supposed to be using. If you can solve those problems for newer companies, you can remove a huge amount of friction. “Our own customer base has evolved as well. We now have enterprise customers, which previously would have been impossible for us. They often begin with pilots because they want to understand whether they can bring those collaboration benefits into much larger organisations. Their existing systems are often decades old, and people hate using them.” Europe can fund research — but can it fund hardware companies? Rebel believes there's also frustration among European startups. “They see regulation limiting things such as material choices or how products need to be designed. That's why initiatives such as EU Inc. are interesting. There is an impetus to build European companies and take advantage of the European market, but we need to make it easier in practice.” We were seeing a huge number of hardware projects emerging through the community, but the capital wasn't following them. Rebel admits she originally thought a more community-driven growth model for hardware could work “because we'd seen it work in other sectors.”  “But one trend I expected to emerge — and didn't, at least to the extent I expected — was much greater access to capital for hardware. Europe has an opportunity to bridge that gap. Sometimes what a hardware startup needs is €20,000 or €50,000 to get to its first working prototype." The China problem in European hardware sovereignty In terms of European hardware sovereignty, Rebel sees electronics as a major sticking point. When the company launched its manufacturing network, the team spoke to open-source hardware companies about diversifying their supply chains. Products that had historically been manufactured in one location could potentially be produced by additional suppliers, opening up access to markets such as the US. But electronics repeatedly proved more difficult. “You might be able to fabricate an enclosure in the US or Europe, but the core electronic components simply weren’t available locally, or the European pricing made the final product uncompetitive.” Rebel says this highlights the strength of China’s manufacturing ecosystem, where component suppliers, manufacturing expertise, and entrepreneurs operate in close proximity. “You see the depth of the Chinese ecosystem everywhere. Look at electronics platforms or even Kickstarter: Chinese companies are incredibly entrepreneurial and innovative, and we’re seeing the same thing now in robotics.” For European startups, the challenge is particularly acute during the earliest stages of product development. Rebel has seen founders receive European manufacturing quotes that simply make their first functioning prototypes economically unviable. “They say, ‘We simply can't do that. We need to test whether this works so that we can raise our next investment.’” A hardware startup might need validation from its first thousand customers before investors are willing to provide further funding.  “Yet reaching those customers may require sourcing or manufacturing at least part of the product outside the EU. Once they reach larger production volumes, they may have more European options. But those early stages create a real constraint.” Digital manufacturing requires more than uploading a file Rebel argues that the digitalisation of manufacturing is not something that happens once. Like AI adoption, it is an ongoing process. “Specifying something for manufacturing requires enormous practical knowledge. Every 3D printer, every material, and every manufacturing process can involve a long list of configuration choices.” Some digital manufacturing platforms make the process appear as simple as uploading a file and receiving a finished part. But specifying something for manufacturing requires enormous practical knowledge. Every 3D printer, every material, and every manufacturing process can involve a long list of configuration choices. While some digital manufacturing platforms make the process appear as simple as uploading a file and receiving a finished part, Rebel says the reality is considerably more complex. “There has to be a conversation around tolerances and other manufacturing requirements. We've had more than 15 years of Horizon programmes and, through Wikifactory, we were involved in distributed manufacturing initiatives bringing together some of the best universities across Europe. There is a genuine grassroots ecosystem, including projects looking at how manufacturing can become more inclusive.” She believes one way Europe can strengthen its hardware ecosystem is by giving students and young companies more opportunities to develop these skills in practice, including grants that allow startups to take prototypes through to genuinely functioning products. Design for manufacturing, she argues, can ultimately make or break a hardware startup. But education is only part of the equation, we also need to better connect startups and universities with Europe’s small and medium-sized manufacturers. “There are many excellent production providers in Europe. We need to make them more visible and connect them with the next generation of companies so startups can learn from their experience and reduce mistakes.” Software can also help make those relationships more efficient. With CAD Rooms, for example, a team can share a 3D model with a manufacturer inside an encrypted environment, allowing the manufacturer to review and discuss the design without necessarily downloading the source file. The alternative can involve exporting the design to a STEP file, breaking its connection with the original source model, and then communicating proposed changes through screenshots and lengthy annotated email threads. “That’s where mistakes happen. Hardware is hard, and mistakes are unforgiving. It’s not software where you break something and fix it a minute later.” Ultimately, Rebel sees improving efficiency as an important part of making European hardware manufacturing more competitive. “If we can make European hardware companies more efficient, they have a much better chance of competing.” “at the cusp of a hardware age.” For Rebel, timing is everything:  “We've been involved in bids in the past where sometimes we were simply too early. That's one of the lessons from Wikifactory: you often think you're too late when actually you're ahead of where the market is.” Now, she feels we’re “at the cusp of a hardware age.” “We know we're able to provide an EU-hosted, end-to-end PDM solution.” Rebel predicts that we could be entering a golden age for hardware financing. The risk in robotics and defencetech hackerspaces has, for example, parallels with COVID, when you saw these incredible communities emerge incredibly quickly. Thousands of people were working on open-source engineering projects, medical equipment and other urgent problems. But when confinement ended, many of those communities disappeared almost immediately. Rebel muses that perhaps the entrepreneurial layer was missing. “If that isn't there from the beginning, it can be very difficult to turn an emergency initiative into a sustainable company. That's what makes building the underlying industrial ecosystem so important. Once you have that fabric, it can sustain innovation over time.” Rebel also reflects a growing sentiment. that there are diverse ways to success, especially when it comes to company growth: “At one stage I had a team of around 30. Now we're a team of five, and we're much more effective. That's because we're focused on the core problem and the core user. We're spending our time building the product for them.”

The EU Industrial Accelerator Act (IAA), proposed by the European Commission in March, aims to ensure Europe manufactures more of the technologies and industrial products it consumes. Europe has historically been good at funding R&D and early-stage deep tech, but less successful at creating domestic markets for the resulting technologies. The IAA attempts to address the demand side through measures including public procurement. But if "Made in EU" requirements are to strengthen European industrial sovereignty, how far upstream should they extend? Christina Rebel is the CEO of CAD ROOMS, a female-founded engineering collaboration platform running on EU-hosted infrastructure and built specifically for distributed hardware engineering teams. CAD ROOMS is a cloud-based product data management and collaboration platform that allows engineering teams to manage, review, and securely share CAD files across different design tools without replacing the CAD software they already use. Rebel contends that the IAA is a bigger deal for engineering teams than most people are realising. “If ‘made in EU’ becomes a condition of public procurement, the conversation can’t stop at the product rolling off the line.  It has to start much earlier — at the tools your team uses to design it, version it, and collaborate on it.” Right now, most engineering teams are running their entire product development process through US-hosted platforms. Every CAD file, every revision, every piece of IP lives on infrastructure outside EU jurisdiction. That’s a problem that a procurement label on the finished product doesn’t fix. From open-source hardware to CAD ROOMS Rebel has over a decade of experience in cloud engineering collaboration, digital manufacturing, CAD data management, and distributed product development. Rebel is both Spanish and Dutch and grew up internationally, including in China where she saw the internationalisation of production first-hand.  Following study in politics and economics at university, she spent time helping others build startups, from idea generation to business-model development. At the same time, the maker movement was emerging. She recalled: “I was fascinated by the way people were starting to share hardware designs in the way software developers shared code: building on the shoulders of giants, remixing things, and learning from one another.” From this, Wikifactory emerged in 2016, essentially a cloud collaboration and product-data platform for hardware engineering and manufacturing like GitHub, a CAD collaboration tool, and a manufacturing platform, but built specifically for people designing physical products. The community grew to around 150,000 engineers around the world, and served much of the Fab Lab and makerspace ecosystem.  However, Rebel admitted that the team realised the model was difficult to scale sustainably. The team had spent about two years trying to work out how to marry open-source and private collaboration in hardware and engineering, “Ultimately we realised you can't really marry those two contexts. For commercial customers, the possibility that their IP could be disclosed was obviously a huge concern.”   At the same time, she was hearing more and more from professional engineers that what they really needed was the private product data management and collaboration side of what they'd built. The team separated its fully private product into a completely different environment and founded CAD Rooms. The product is end-to-end encrypted, both in transit and at rest, and the company subsequently achieved ISO certification. Engineering software is still stuck in the 1990s Rebel contends that engineers are probably one of the professional groups that have been least well served by modern software.  She asserts that engineers are still collaborating like it's the 1990s.  “You're talking about siloed, bureaucratic and rigid systems, and they need modern collaboration tools.” One of the biggest issues is that industrial companies don't necessarily use a single CAD tool. They might be using PTC Creo alongside SOLIDWORKS, or SOLIDWORKS alongside CATIA, or another combination. And they’re not necessarily going to buy and implement a vendor-specific Product Data Management system for every CAD tool they use. These systems can be expensive, and implementation can take a long time. Instead, they need something simpler and interoperable that works regardless of which CAD system you're using. CAD Rooms also wants to bring down the barriers to collaboration: “You shouldn't necessarily need to have CAD software installed simply to participate in a design review. You should be able to measure, review and collaborate professionally around the design in a secure environment.” Further, today’s software needs to accommodate  Mechanical engineers increasingly need to work alongside electronic engineers, for example, who may be using much more modern tools such as Altium, which is already cloud-based. When legacy mechanical engineering tools don't work effectively with those systems, information starts falling through the cracks. The same applies to simulation. Incredibly powerful simulation tools are emerging, creating opportunities for new companies to enter areas such as satellites and aerospace. Rebel asserts that Europe has amazing industrial clusters, so new players genuinely have a chance. But they're not necessarily taking full advantage of those newer tools because their legacy systems don't interoperate seamlessly with them. The wrong part gets sent to the manufacturer. Somebody overrides somebody else's work. People spend a day trying to work out which version they're supposed to be using. If you can solve those problems for newer companies, you can remove a huge amount of friction. “Our own customer base has evolved as well. We now have enterprise customers, which previously would have been impossible for us. They often begin with pilots because they want to understand whether they can bring those collaboration benefits into much larger organisations. Their existing systems are often decades old, and people hate using them.” Europe can fund research — but can it fund hardware companies? Rebel believes there's also frustration among European startups. “They see regulation limiting things such as material choices or how products need to be designed. That's why initiatives such as EU Inc. are interesting. There is an impetus to build European companies and take advantage of the European market, but we need to make it easier in practice.” We were seeing a huge number of hardware projects emerging through the community, but the capital wasn't following them. Rebel admits she originally thought a more community-driven growth model for hardware could work “because we'd seen it work in other sectors.”  “But one trend I expected to emerge — and didn't, at least to the extent I expected — was much greater access to capital for hardware. Europe has an opportunity to bridge that gap. Sometimes what a hardware startup needs is €20,000 or €50,000 to get to its first working prototype." The China problem in European hardware sovereignty In terms of European hardware sovereignty, Rebel sees electronics as a major sticking point. When the company launched its manufacturing network, the team spoke to open-source hardware companies about diversifying their supply chains. Products that had historically been manufactured in one location could potentially be produced by additional suppliers, opening up access to markets such as the US. But electronics repeatedly proved more difficult. “You might be able to fabricate an enclosure in the US or Europe, but the core electronic components simply weren’t available locally, or the European pricing made the final product uncompetitive.” Rebel says this highlights the strength of China’s manufacturing ecosystem, where component suppliers, manufacturing expertise, and entrepreneurs operate in close proximity. “You see the depth of the Chinese ecosystem everywhere. Look at electronics platforms or even Kickstarter: Chinese companies are incredibly entrepreneurial and innovative, and we’re seeing the same thing now in robotics.” For European startups, the challenge is particularly acute during the earliest stages of product development. Rebel has seen founders receive European manufacturing quotes that simply make their first functioning prototypes economically unviable. “They say, ‘We simply can't do that. We need to test whether this works so that we can raise our next investment.’” A hardware startup might need validation from its first thousand customers before investors are willing to provide further funding.  “Yet reaching those customers may require sourcing or manufacturing at least part of the product outside the EU. Once they reach larger production volumes, they may have more European options. But those early stages create a real constraint.” Digital manufacturing requires more than uploading a file Rebel argues that the digitalisation of manufacturing is not something that happens once. Like AI adoption, it is an ongoing process. “Specifying something for manufacturing requires enormous practical knowledge. Every 3D printer, every material, and every manufacturing process can involve a long list of configuration choices.” Some digital manufacturing platforms make the process appear as simple as uploading a file and receiving a finished part. But specifying something for manufacturing requires enormous practical knowledge. Every 3D printer, every material, and every manufacturing process can involve a long list of configuration choices. While some digital manufacturing platforms make the process appear as simple as uploading a file and receiving a finished part, Rebel says the reality is considerably more complex. “There has to be a conversation around tolerances and other manufacturing requirements. We've had more than 15 years of Horizon programmes and, through Wikifactory, we were involved in distributed manufacturing initiatives bringing together some of the best universities across Europe. There is a genuine grassroots ecosystem, including projects looking at how manufacturing can become more inclusive.” She believes one way Europe can strengthen its hardware ecosystem is by giving students and young companies more opportunities to develop these skills in practice, including grants that allow startups to take prototypes through to genuinely functioning products. Design for manufacturing, she argues, can ultimately make or break a hardware startup. But education is only part of the equation, we also need to better connect startups and universities with Europe’s small and medium-sized manufacturers. “There are many excellent production providers in Europe. We need to make them more visible and connect them with the next generation of companies so startups can learn from their experience and reduce mistakes.” Software can also help make those relationships more efficient. With CAD Rooms, for example, a team can share a 3D model with a manufacturer inside an encrypted environment, allowing the manufacturer to review and discuss the design without necessarily downloading the source file. The alternative can involve exporting the design to a STEP file, breaking its connection with the original source model, and then communicating proposed changes through screenshots and lengthy annotated email threads. “That’s where mistakes happen. Hardware is hard, and mistakes are unforgiving. It’s not software where you break something and fix it a minute later.” Ultimately, Rebel sees improving efficiency as an important part of making European hardware manufacturing more competitive. “If we can make European hardware companies more efficient, they have a much better chance of competing.” “at the cusp of a hardware age.” For Rebel, timing is everything:  “We've been involved in bids in the past where sometimes we were simply too early. That's one of the lessons from Wikifactory: you often think you're too late when actually you're ahead of where the market is.” Now, she feels we’re “at the cusp of a hardware age.” “We know we're able to provide an EU-hosted, end-to-end PDM solution.” Rebel predicts that we could be entering a golden age for hardware financing. The risk in robotics and defencetech hackerspaces has, for example, parallels with COVID, when you saw these incredible communities emerge incredibly quickly. Thousands of people were working on open-source engineering projects, medical equipment and other urgent problems. But when confinement ended, many of those communities disappeared almost immediately. Rebel muses that perhaps the entrepreneurial layer was missing. “If that isn't there from the beginning, it can be very difficult to turn an emergency initiative into a sustainable company. That's what makes building the underlying industrial ecosystem so important. Once you have that fabric, it can sustain innovation over time.” Rebel also reflects a growing sentiment. that there are diverse ways to success, especially when it comes to company growth: “At one stage I had a team of around 30. Now we're a team of five, and we're much more effective. That's because we're focused on the core problem and the core user. We're spending our time building the product for them.”

Swedish foodtech company Millow has raised €2 million in funding to expand production capacity and strengthen its commercial operations as it targets the Nordic foodservice market. The round was led by serial entrepreneur and angel investor Magnus Emilson, with participation from Jan Enhager, co-founder of Vitamin Well, the group behind NOCCO and Barebells, who will also join Millow as a strategic adviser to CEO Fredrik Öhrn. The round included two co-founders of Swedish technology companies, alongside strategic private investors from the Swedish food sector. Founded in 2020, Millow develops mycelium-based protein ingredients for the B2B foodservice and retail markets. The company builds on more than 25 years of research into fermentation and fungi-based proteins and uses a patented solid-state fermentation process that combines Swedish oats with mycelium. The resulting protein ingredient is made from two core ingredients without binders or additives. Unlike plant-based alternatives, Millow's product is fungi-based and is designed to work in the kitchen in formats already familiar to chefs. Millow says its production process uses between three and four litres of water per kilogram of product. According to an independent assessment by Swedish research institute RISE, the product has a carbon footprint of 0.32 kg CO₂e per kilogram, approximately 98 per cent lower than Swedish beef. Alongside the funding round, the European Patent Office confirmed that the nine-month opposition period for Millow's core patent ended with no oppositions filed. The patent covers the low-water production method underpinning the company's fermentation process. The new capital will be used to increase production capacity and build out Millow's commercial team as the company expands in the Nordic foodservice market. Millow is currently in discussions with major foodservice operators and distributors across the region, with international interest also growing.

Swedish foodtech company Millow has raised €2 million in funding to expand production capacity and strengthen its commercial operations as it targets the Nordic foodservice market. The round was led by serial entrepreneur and angel investor Magnus Emilson, with participation from Jan Enhager, co-founder of Vitamin Well, the group behind NOCCO and Barebells, who will also join Millow as a strategic adviser to CEO Fredrik Öhrn. The round included two co-founders of Swedish technology companies, alongside strategic private investors from the Swedish food sector. Founded in 2020, Millow develops mycelium-based protein ingredients for the B2B foodservice and retail markets. The company builds on more than 25 years of research into fermentation and fungi-based proteins and uses a patented solid-state fermentation process that combines Swedish oats with mycelium. The resulting protein ingredient is made from two core ingredients without binders or additives. Unlike plant-based alternatives, Millow's product is fungi-based and is designed to work in the kitchen in formats already familiar to chefs. Millow says its production process uses between three and four litres of water per kilogram of product. According to an independent assessment by Swedish research institute RISE, the product has a carbon footprint of 0.32 kg CO₂e per kilogram, approximately 98 per cent lower than Swedish beef. Alongside the funding round, the European Patent Office confirmed that the nine-month opposition period for Millow's core patent ended with no oppositions filed. The patent covers the low-water production method underpinning the company's fermentation process. The new capital will be used to increase production capacity and build out Millow's commercial team as the company expands in the Nordic foodservice market. Millow is currently in discussions with major foodservice operators and distributors across the region, with international interest also growing.

UK-based water technology startup Metal Morph has raised £700,000 in pre-seed funding to advance its technology for recovering industrial resources from water and wastewater treatment processes. The round was co-led by Sustainable Ventures and Green Angel Ventures, with participation from Aqcelerator and Found Capital. Founded in 2025, Metal Morph is developing an infrastructure-as-a-service solution that recovers industrial materials from municipal and industrial wastewater. Its first technology focuses on recovering aluminium and iron-based treatment chemicals that would otherwise be discharged to sewers, sent to landfill or spread on land. The recovered chemicals can be reused in water treatment processes, creating a circular system designed to reduce reliance on primary supply chains while lowering procurement costs and associated carbon emissions. The company plans to expand its technology to recover standalone metals from industrial wastewater and mining tailings. Growing up in a place where access to clean water was uncertain instilled within me an appreciation of how fragile access to essential resources can be. With Metal Morph, I want to help change that reality. Water infrastructure is one of the most overlooked industrial supply chains in the world. By harnessing them correctly, we are fundamentally reshaping the supply of essential chemicals to reduce the cost of water production, said Moletsane Mophethe, founder and CEO of Metal Morph. The company has completed more than 50 live tests across three drinking water treatment plants. According to Metal Morph, the tests demonstrated recovery of up to 90 per cent of spent treatment chemicals at 95 per cent purity, alongside a 26 per cent reduction in coagulation-related operating costs and an 89 per cent reduction in emissions associated with coagulant procurement. Metal Morph is working with six UK water utilities, which together represent 56 per cent of the UK water market. The company has also received a £100,000 grant from UK water regulator Ofwat, with a further £450,000 available subject to achieving agreed milestones. The new funding will be used to further develop Metal Morph’s resource recovery technology, roll out industry pilots and continue validation with water utilities and industrial partners. The company is also exploring opportunities in European markets, including potential demonstrations in Estonia, while discussions are underway with Belgian water utility Aquafin.

UK-based water technology startup Metal Morph has raised £700,000 in pre-seed funding to advance its technology for recovering industrial resources from water and wastewater treatment processes. The round was co-led by Sustainable Ventures and Green Angel Ventures, with participation from Aqcelerator and Found Capital. Founded in 2025, Metal Morph is developing an infrastructure-as-a-service solution that recovers industrial materials from municipal and industrial wastewater. Its first technology focuses on recovering aluminium and iron-based treatment chemicals that would otherwise be discharged to sewers, sent to landfill or spread on land. The recovered chemicals can be reused in water treatment processes, creating a circular system designed to reduce reliance on primary supply chains while lowering procurement costs and associated carbon emissions. The company plans to expand its technology to recover standalone metals from industrial wastewater and mining tailings. Growing up in a place where access to clean water was uncertain instilled within me an appreciation of how fragile access to essential resources can be. With Metal Morph, I want to help change that reality. Water infrastructure is one of the most overlooked industrial supply chains in the world. By harnessing them correctly, we are fundamentally reshaping the supply of essential chemicals to reduce the cost of water production, said Moletsane Mophethe, founder and CEO of Metal Morph. The company has completed more than 50 live tests across three drinking water treatment plants. According to Metal Morph, the tests demonstrated recovery of up to 90 per cent of spent treatment chemicals at 95 per cent purity, alongside a 26 per cent reduction in coagulation-related operating costs and an 89 per cent reduction in emissions associated with coagulant procurement. Metal Morph is working with six UK water utilities, which together represent 56 per cent of the UK water market. The company has also received a £100,000 grant from UK water regulator Ofwat, with a further £450,000 available subject to achieving agreed milestones. The new funding will be used to further develop Metal Morph’s resource recovery technology, roll out industry pilots and continue validation with water utilities and industrial partners. The company is also exploring opportunities in European markets, including potential demonstrations in Estonia, while discussions are underway with Belgian water utility Aquafin.

Today sees the expansion of QuBriC, Europe's first Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) Doctoral Network dedicated to quantum error correction (QEC), with the addition of fault-tolerant quantum computing scaleup Alice & Bob. QuBriC brings together 16 universities and seven quantum companies across Europe, including ETH Zürich, TU Delft, UCL, INRIA, Riverlane and IQM, to recruit and train 15 doctoral researchers.  Backed by €4.6 million in funding over 48 months through Horizon Europe's MSCA programme, the network will develop a new generation of researchers capable of tackling one of quantum computing's biggest technical challenges: quantum error correction. Quantum error correction is widely recognised as the key to building scalable, fault-tolerant quantum computers. Yet expertise remains fragmented, with researchers typically specialising in either classical coding theory or quantum physics. QuBriC aims to bridge that divide by training researchers across the full quantum error correction stack - from theory and algorithms to hardware implementation. As an industry partner, Alice & Bob will help shape the network's research and training while contributing expertise in cat-qubit-based error correction. For the company, QuBriC provides access to a pipeline of highly specialised talent and an academic network closely aligned on fault-tolerant quantum computing. The MSCA program is celebrating its 30th birthday, having advanced research and innovation for the last 30 years. It has supported over 150,000 researchers, including 23 Nobel Prize winners.  The programme has been a cornerstone of European research by fostering mobility across disciplines, sectors, and countries and attracting and nurturing top talent within academia and businesses. Unlike traditional research grants, MSCA Doctoral Networks fund international consortia of universities, research organisations and industry partners to jointly recruit, train and supervise PhD researchers. Doctoral candidates undertake interdisciplinary research while working across academic and industrial environments, equipping them with the technical and transferable skills needed to address major scientific and technological challenges. "Quantum error correction sits at the heart of any fault-tolerant quantum computer, interacting with all aspects of it. As such, it requires expertise spanning seemingly separate disciplines," said Christophe Vuillot, Principal Research Scientist , QEC at Alice & Bob. "QuBriC brings together leading universities, research institutes and quantum companies to train researchers and bridge these gaps, combining expertise from quantum information, coding theory and hardware engineering. This next generation of researchers will be essential to accelerating the path to useful, fault-tolerant quantum computers." Advised by Nobel Prize-winning researchers, Alice & Bob specialises in cat qubits, a technology developed by the company’s founders. It aims to create the first universal, fault-tolerant quantum computer. Demonstrating the power of its cat architecture, Alice & Bob recently showed that it could reduce the hardware requirements for building a useful large-scale quantum computer up to 200 times compared with competing approaches. Founded in 2020, the company has raised €180 million in funding and employs more than 250 people.

Today sees the expansion of QuBriC, Europe's first Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) Doctoral Network dedicated to quantum error correction (QEC), with the addition of fault-tolerant quantum computing scaleup Alice & Bob. QuBriC brings together 16 universities and seven quantum companies across Europe, including ETH Zürich, TU Delft, UCL, INRIA, Riverlane and IQM, to recruit and train 15 doctoral researchers.  Backed by €4.6 million in funding over 48 months through Horizon Europe's MSCA programme, the network will develop a new generation of researchers capable of tackling one of quantum computing's biggest technical challenges: quantum error correction. Quantum error correction is widely recognised as the key to building scalable, fault-tolerant quantum computers. Yet expertise remains fragmented, with researchers typically specialising in either classical coding theory or quantum physics. QuBriC aims to bridge that divide by training researchers across the full quantum error correction stack - from theory and algorithms to hardware implementation. As an industry partner, Alice & Bob will help shape the network's research and training while contributing expertise in cat-qubit-based error correction. For the company, QuBriC provides access to a pipeline of highly specialised talent and an academic network closely aligned on fault-tolerant quantum computing. The MSCA program is celebrating its 30th birthday, having advanced research and innovation for the last 30 years. It has supported over 150,000 researchers, including 23 Nobel Prize winners.  The programme has been a cornerstone of European research by fostering mobility across disciplines, sectors, and countries and attracting and nurturing top talent within academia and businesses. Unlike traditional research grants, MSCA Doctoral Networks fund international consortia of universities, research organisations and industry partners to jointly recruit, train and supervise PhD researchers. Doctoral candidates undertake interdisciplinary research while working across academic and industrial environments, equipping them with the technical and transferable skills needed to address major scientific and technological challenges. "Quantum error correction sits at the heart of any fault-tolerant quantum computer, interacting with all aspects of it. As such, it requires expertise spanning seemingly separate disciplines," said Christophe Vuillot, Principal Research Scientist , QEC at Alice & Bob. "QuBriC brings together leading universities, research institutes and quantum companies to train researchers and bridge these gaps, combining expertise from quantum information, coding theory and hardware engineering. This next generation of researchers will be essential to accelerating the path to useful, fault-tolerant quantum computers." Advised by Nobel Prize-winning researchers, Alice & Bob specialises in cat qubits, a technology developed by the company’s founders. It aims to create the first universal, fault-tolerant quantum computer. Demonstrating the power of its cat architecture, Alice & Bob recently showed that it could reduce the hardware requirements for building a useful large-scale quantum computer up to 200 times compared with competing approaches. Founded in 2020, the company has raised €180 million in funding and employs more than 250 people.

Swedish vibe-coding startup Lovable has raised $400m in new funding, at a $13.3bn valuation, more than double its valuation at its last funding round, in a round which was co-led by Europe’s new €5bn investment fund. Lovable, one of Europe’s most prominent startups, has raised a Series C round which was co-led by Silicon Valley investor Menlo Ventures and the Scaleup Europe Fund, managed by EQT. The new funding is more than double Lovable’s December 2025 $6.6bn valuation when it raised $330m. Other investors in the round include Europe’s Balderton Capital and Carmignac, Latin America-based Kaszek Ventures and LTS Growth, Asia’s Tencent and World Innovation Lab and US-based investor Regent. Returning investors include Accel, Antler, CapitalG, DST Global, Evantic Capital, HubSpot Ventures, and Salesforce Ventures. Looking ahead, Lovable, which launched in 2024, which allows non-coders to build software, in a practice that is called vibe-coding, said it will continue to leverage multiple AI models to power its tech amid concern about token expense paid out to AI labs from startups like Lovable. It said: “Lovable will continue to draw on the strengths of multiple models, matching each part of the work to the model best suited to handle it and bringing the results together into one seamless experience. We will also continue post-training promising open-source models, with the goal of making the Lovable experience increasingly personal to each person’s goals, context, and way of working.” Lovable, which faces competition from startups like Replit and could also face stiffer challenges from the likes of Anthropic and OpenAI should they move further into app creation, said that apps built on top of Lovable see over 900m visits every month. Stockholm-based Lovable, whose customers include Nvidia, Adidas, and Zendesk, will use the funding to grow the number of its business customers and expansion, including growing its headcount by 50 per cent to 450 this year across Sweden and the US. It will also look to develop Lovable beyond prompts, so it becomes more proactive with users. Matt Murphy, partner, Menlo Ventures, said: "From the very start, Lovable was built for the billions of people with the creativity and knowledge to make something, but who had always been blocked by technical ability. That focus has created extraordinary growth, a product people love, and a market that expands every time someone becomes a founder or a company rethinks how software gets made.“

Swedish vibe-coding startup Lovable has raised $400m in new funding, at a $13.3bn valuation, more than double its valuation at its last funding round, in a round which was co-led by Europe’s new €5bn investment fund. Lovable, one of Europe’s most prominent startups, has raised a Series C round which was co-led by Silicon Valley investor Menlo Ventures and the Scaleup Europe Fund, managed by EQT. The new funding is more than double Lovable’s December 2025 $6.6bn valuation when it raised $330m. Other investors in the round include Europe’s Balderton Capital and Carmignac, Latin America-based Kaszek Ventures and LTS Growth, Asia’s Tencent and World Innovation Lab and US-based investor Regent. Returning investors include Accel, Antler, CapitalG, DST Global, Evantic Capital, HubSpot Ventures, and Salesforce Ventures. Looking ahead, Lovable, which launched in 2024, which allows non-coders to build software, in a practice that is called vibe-coding, said it will continue to leverage multiple AI models to power its tech amid concern about token expense paid out to AI labs from startups like Lovable. It said: “Lovable will continue to draw on the strengths of multiple models, matching each part of the work to the model best suited to handle it and bringing the results together into one seamless experience. We will also continue post-training promising open-source models, with the goal of making the Lovable experience increasingly personal to each person’s goals, context, and way of working.” Lovable, which faces competition from startups like Replit and could also face stiffer challenges from the likes of Anthropic and OpenAI should they move further into app creation, said that apps built on top of Lovable see over 900m visits every month. Stockholm-based Lovable, whose customers include Nvidia, Adidas, and Zendesk, will use the funding to grow the number of its business customers and expansion, including growing its headcount by 50 per cent to 450 this year across Sweden and the US. It will also look to develop Lovable beyond prompts, so it becomes more proactive with users. Matt Murphy, partner, Menlo Ventures, said: "From the very start, Lovable was built for the billions of people with the creativity and knowledge to make something, but who had always been blocked by technical ability. That focus has created extraordinary growth, a product people love, and a market that expands every time someone becomes a founder or a company rethinks how software gets made.“

The VC giant, which has backed Lovable, Synthesia and other current prominent European startups, has raised an enlarged $800m fund to invest in early-stage startups across Europe and Israel as part of an overall $3.5bn raise to invest in early-stage startups globally.   Accel, which has offices in Silicon Valley, London and Bangalore, has raised $3.5bn in new funds in total, which is split across four funds. These are $1.35bn for a global expansion fund, geared to larger early-stage rounds and follow-on investments; $800m for investing in US startups; $800m targeting European and Israeli investments; and $550m placing bets on Indian startups. Accel said: “These funds support our early-stage strategies in the US, Europe, Israel, and India, while providing additional capital for larger initial investments and follow-ons." The global VC, which has also backed Anthropic and Cursor, set up its team in London over 25 years ago, and its latest dedicated European and Israel fund marks Accel’s ninth fund of its type. It is bigger than its $650m predecessor fund across Europe and Israel. Accel believes its decision to be one of the first Silicon Valley venture firms to set up a European team has proved well-placed. Accel, which has backed the likes of Monzo, Trade Republic, Vinted and more recently Lovable, Legora, n8n and Synthesia, is betting that its global footprint will help it win deals. In a press release, Accel made several references to AI, saying that AI's “current transformation is still in its early stage”. Harry Nelis, partner at Accel, who is based in London, said: “Our focus remains on building relationships and partnering with founders at the earliest stages, helping them turn their initial vision into enduring success stories. “There has never been a more exciting time to start a company. AI is the most transformative technology we have ever seen, opening up new areas for innovation and compressing the time it takes to go from an idea to a scaled business. We’re looking forward to backing the next generation as they shape what comes next.”

The VC giant, which has backed Lovable, Synthesia and other current prominent European startups, has raised an enlarged $800m fund to invest in early-stage startups across Europe and Israel as part of an overall $3.5bn raise to invest in early-stage startups globally.   Accel, which has offices in Silicon Valley, London and Bangalore, has raised $3.5bn in new funds in total, which is split across four funds. These are $1.35bn for a global expansion fund, geared to larger early-stage rounds and follow-on investments; $800m for investing in US startups; $800m targeting European and Israeli investments; and $550m placing bets on Indian startups. Accel said: “These funds support our early-stage strategies in the US, Europe, Israel, and India, while providing additional capital for larger initial investments and follow-ons." The global VC, which has also backed Anthropic and Cursor, set up its team in London over 25 years ago, and its latest dedicated European and Israel fund marks Accel’s ninth fund of its type. It is bigger than its $650m predecessor fund across Europe and Israel. Accel believes its decision to be one of the first Silicon Valley venture firms to set up a European team has proved well-placed. Accel, which has backed the likes of Monzo, Trade Republic, Vinted and more recently Lovable, Legora, n8n and Synthesia, is betting that its global footprint will help it win deals. In a press release, Accel made several references to AI, saying that AI's “current transformation is still in its early stage”. Harry Nelis, partner at Accel, who is based in London, said: “Our focus remains on building relationships and partnering with founders at the earliest stages, helping them turn their initial vision into enduring success stories. “There has never been a more exciting time to start a company. AI is the most transformative technology we have ever seen, opening up new areas for innovation and compressing the time it takes to go from an idea to a scaled business. We’re looking forward to backing the next generation as they shape what comes next.”

Companies that receive funding from the EU’s Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) can take part in initiatives that have a major impact on innovation – in some instances securing nearly one patent per funded project. Over the past 30 years, the MSCA has funded over 150,000 researchers to pursue their ideas as part of doctoral training networks, postdoctoral fellowships and staff exchange programmes. Collaboration between universities and private sector companies has been a fundamental part of this since the MSCA’s inception in 1996, and the involvement of industrial partners has expanded steadily over the past three decades, allowing SMEs to tap into growing international innovation networks. So far under Horizon Europe, the EU’s research funding programme running from the start of 2021 to the end of 2027, more than 4,300 businesses, including over 2,200 SMEs, have participated in MSCA projects. The non-academic sector now represents almost half of all participating organisations. The MSCA has produced a business hub page to help companies get the most out of the doctoral networks, postdoctoral fellowships and staff exchanges it funds. SMEs can work with universities and research institutes in any MSCA action, building the skills of their team and getting access to specialised expertise and advanced technologies. MSCA Doctoral Networks bring together universities, research organisations and businesses to train doctoral researchers while tackling real-world innovation challenges. Doctoral Networks recruit and train doctoral candidates through joint research projects. A recent study of selected industry-focused MSCA Doctoral Networks found that some highly innovative projects generated almost one patent each, illustrating the programme's contribution to knowledge transfer and commercialisation. The findings highlight the value of long-term collaboration between academia and businesses. MSCA Staff Exchanges allow researchers and research support staff to work across sectors and countries, helping organisations exchange expertise and build lasting research partnerships., while the In addition, COFUND enables research-performing organisations to recruit and train researchers through co-funded doctoral and postdoctoral programmes, reducing the costs associated with running these schemes. For example, in the MSCA-funded EMPOWER COFUND project, three universities and 14 companies and public authorities are working together to train doctoral candidates in a business-oriented programme, enabling them to develop sustainable water management solutions. The recent Choose Europe for Science pilot further expands opportunities for organisations to recruit outstanding researchers through longer-term positions. The action supports projects where both academic and non-academic organisations recruit postdoctoral researchers with a view to offering longer-term employment beyond the project period. The idea is also to widen adoption of MSCA’s best practice in research, promoting high standards and excellent working conditions. Together, these actions enable SMEs to participate in collaborative research projects, access specialised expertise and contribute to the development of new technologies and innovative solutions. Cross-sector collaboration is at the heart of the MSCA, enabling researchers and businesses to exchange knowledge, build long-term partnerships and develop skills that can support innovation. International mobility is another defining feature of the MSCA. By bringing together organisations and researchers from different countries, it gives participating businesses access to wider talent pools, international expertise and long-term research networks. Many researchers remain in Europe after completing their fellowship. For businesses, this helps grow the number of internationally experienced researchers available for recruitment and collaboration. From research collaboration to entrepreneurship The programme's emphasis on cross-sector collaboration has also helped researchers build successful innovation-driven companies. For example, in 2019, Michela Puddu became the first MSCA alumna to win the European Prize for Women Innovators, which recognises the most talented women entrepreneurs across the EU and Horizon Europe associated countries. As co-founder and CEO of Haelixa, an ETH Zurich spin-off, Puddu was awarded the ‘rising innovator’ prize for her company’s intelligent DNA-based tracing solutions, which ensure ethical and transparent industry practices for sustainable products such as organic cotton. Since then, two more MSCA alumni have also been awarded the prize. Maria Fátima Lucas, co-founder and CEO of Barcelona-based biotechnology firm Zymvol, was honoured in 2020 for her work using modelling to design industrial molecules. In 2024, Rana Sanyal won the award for her work on smart nanomedicines for targeted chemotherapy at RS Research, the biotechnology company she co-founded. She had received MSCA support through a Marie Curie International Reintegration Grant project at Boğaziçi University in Turkey and she has described the MSCA support as an important step in building the confidence and international experience that later supported her entrepreneurial journey. By strengthening collaboration between academia and businesses, the MSCA helps translate research into innovation, while giving companies access to international talent and long-term research partnerships. As the programme marks its 30th anniversary, this role is expected to become increasingly important for Europe's innovation ecosystem.

Companies that receive funding from the EU’s Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) can take part in initiatives that have a major impact on innovation – in some instances securing nearly one patent per funded project. Over the past 30 years, the MSCA has funded over 150,000 researchers to pursue their ideas as part of doctoral training networks, postdoctoral fellowships and staff exchange programmes. Collaboration between universities and private sector companies has been a fundamental part of this since the MSCA’s inception in 1996, and the involvement of industrial partners has expanded steadily over the past three decades, allowing SMEs to tap into growing international innovation networks. So far under Horizon Europe, the EU’s research funding programme running from the start of 2021 to the end of 2027, more than 4,300 businesses, including over 2,200 SMEs, have participated in MSCA projects. The non-academic sector now represents almost half of all participating organisations. The MSCA has produced a business hub page to help companies get the most out of the doctoral networks, postdoctoral fellowships and staff exchanges it funds. SMEs can work with universities and research institutes in any MSCA action, building the skills of their team and getting access to specialised expertise and advanced technologies. MSCA Doctoral Networks bring together universities, research organisations and businesses to train doctoral researchers while tackling real-world innovation challenges. Doctoral Networks recruit and train doctoral candidates through joint research projects. A recent study of selected industry-focused MSCA Doctoral Networks found that some highly innovative projects generated almost one patent each, illustrating the programme's contribution to knowledge transfer and commercialisation. The findings highlight the value of long-term collaboration between academia and businesses. MSCA Staff Exchanges allow researchers and research support staff to work across sectors and countries, helping organisations exchange expertise and build lasting research partnerships., while the In addition, COFUND enables research-performing organisations to recruit and train researchers through co-funded doctoral and postdoctoral programmes, reducing the costs associated with running these schemes. For example, in the MSCA-funded EMPOWER COFUND project, three universities and 14 companies and public authorities are working together to train doctoral candidates in a business-oriented programme, enabling them to develop sustainable water management solutions. The recent Choose Europe for Science pilot further expands opportunities for organisations to recruit outstanding researchers through longer-term positions. The action supports projects where both academic and non-academic organisations recruit postdoctoral researchers with a view to offering longer-term employment beyond the project period. The idea is also to widen adoption of MSCA’s best practice in research, promoting high standards and excellent working conditions. Together, these actions enable SMEs to participate in collaborative research projects, access specialised expertise and contribute to the development of new technologies and innovative solutions. Cross-sector collaboration is at the heart of the MSCA, enabling researchers and businesses to exchange knowledge, build long-term partnerships and develop skills that can support innovation. International mobility is another defining feature of the MSCA. By bringing together organisations and researchers from different countries, it gives participating businesses access to wider talent pools, international expertise and long-term research networks. Many researchers remain in Europe after completing their fellowship. For businesses, this helps grow the number of internationally experienced researchers available for recruitment and collaboration. From research collaboration to entrepreneurship The programme's emphasis on cross-sector collaboration has also helped researchers build successful innovation-driven companies. For example, in 2019, Michela Puddu became the first MSCA alumna to win the European Prize for Women Innovators, which recognises the most talented women entrepreneurs across the EU and Horizon Europe associated countries. As co-founder and CEO of Haelixa, an ETH Zurich spin-off, Puddu was awarded the ‘rising innovator’ prize for her company’s intelligent DNA-based tracing solutions, which ensure ethical and transparent industry practices for sustainable products such as organic cotton. Since then, two more MSCA alumni have also been awarded the prize. Maria Fátima Lucas, co-founder and CEO of Barcelona-based biotechnology firm Zymvol, was honoured in 2020 for her work using modelling to design industrial molecules. In 2024, Rana Sanyal won the award for her work on smart nanomedicines for targeted chemotherapy at RS Research, the biotechnology company she co-founded. She had received MSCA support through a Marie Curie International Reintegration Grant project at Boğaziçi University in Turkey and she has described the MSCA support as an important step in building the confidence and international experience that later supported her entrepreneurial journey. By strengthening collaboration between academia and businesses, the MSCA helps translate research into innovation, while giving companies access to international talent and long-term research partnerships. As the programme marks its 30th anniversary, this role is expected to become increasingly important for Europe's innovation ecosystem.

Traveltech company Entravel Group has raised $7.5 million in funding to expand its white-label travel platform and develop a stablecoin-enabled financial layer for the travel industry. The round was co-led by Ethereal Ventures, chaired by Ethereum co-founder Joseph Lubin, and Finality Capital, with participation from GSR, Varrock, G1 Ventures, Seier Capital, Veris Ventures, Funfair Ventures and WTG Ventures. Entravel Group provides technology that enables companies to offer travel booking services under their own brands without having to build and manage supplier integrations and booking systems themselves. Its model is designed to address fragmentation in the travel industry, where hotel inventory, pricing and content are often spread across multiple suppliers and disconnected systems. The group operates through three connected businesses: MocatravelX, Ratestellar and Entravel. MocatravelX works directly with hotels to secure inventory and negotiated rates, while Ratestellar combines this with supply from other sources, providing access to more than 2.2 million hotels. Its AI-powered mapping technology identifies matching hotels and room types across suppliers, helping standardise content and pricing data. Entravel brings these capabilities together into a ready-to-use booking stack for partners. According to founder and CEO Mathias Lundoe Nielsen, users of Entravel Group’s live white-label platforms can save up to 60 per cent on selected hotels, while average booking conversion rates exceed 10 per cent, compared with an industry benchmark of around 1 to 3 per cent. Our model brings together every part of the booking process. Entravel then turns this hotel supply and technology into a ready-to-use stack, said Nielsen. The company is positioning itself around a broader shift in travel distribution as booking services increasingly move beyond dedicated travel websites and into fintech products, super-apps and other digital platforms. Its technology allows companies with established customer bases to add travel services under their own brands, creating an additional revenue stream without having to build a travel business from scratch. Entravel Group is also developing technology for AI-driven travel transactions. While AI tools are increasingly being used for search, comparison and trip planning, converting recommendations into bookings still requires access to live inventory, accurate pricing, structured content and supplier systems. Its product suite includes an AI-native Model Context Protocol (MCP) interface designed to connect AI agents directly with its travel data and booking capabilities. Together with Ratestellar’s standardised hotel content, the interface is intended to support AI agents as travel applications move from planning and recommendations towards completing transactions. The new funding will be used to secure larger supplier credit facilities, support higher booking volumes and expand the company’s white-label model into traditional travel markets. It will also support the launch of a stablecoin-enabled financial layer for settlement, treasury management and working-capital financing.

Traveltech company Entravel Group has raised $7.5 million in funding to expand its white-label travel platform and develop a stablecoin-enabled financial layer for the travel industry. The round was co-led by Ethereal Ventures, chaired by Ethereum co-founder Joseph Lubin, and Finality Capital, with participation from GSR, Varrock, G1 Ventures, Seier Capital, Veris Ventures, Funfair Ventures and WTG Ventures. Entravel Group provides technology that enables companies to offer travel booking services under their own brands without having to build and manage supplier integrations and booking systems themselves. Its model is designed to address fragmentation in the travel industry, where hotel inventory, pricing and content are often spread across multiple suppliers and disconnected systems. The group operates through three connected businesses: MocatravelX, Ratestellar and Entravel. MocatravelX works directly with hotels to secure inventory and negotiated rates, while Ratestellar combines this with supply from other sources, providing access to more than 2.2 million hotels. Its AI-powered mapping technology identifies matching hotels and room types across suppliers, helping standardise content and pricing data. Entravel brings these capabilities together into a ready-to-use booking stack for partners. According to founder and CEO Mathias Lundoe Nielsen, users of Entravel Group’s live white-label platforms can save up to 60 per cent on selected hotels, while average booking conversion rates exceed 10 per cent, compared with an industry benchmark of around 1 to 3 per cent. Our model brings together every part of the booking process. Entravel then turns this hotel supply and technology into a ready-to-use stack, said Nielsen. The company is positioning itself around a broader shift in travel distribution as booking services increasingly move beyond dedicated travel websites and into fintech products, super-apps and other digital platforms. Its technology allows companies with established customer bases to add travel services under their own brands, creating an additional revenue stream without having to build a travel business from scratch. Entravel Group is also developing technology for AI-driven travel transactions. While AI tools are increasingly being used for search, comparison and trip planning, converting recommendations into bookings still requires access to live inventory, accurate pricing, structured content and supplier systems. Its product suite includes an AI-native Model Context Protocol (MCP) interface designed to connect AI agents directly with its travel data and booking capabilities. Together with Ratestellar’s standardised hotel content, the interface is intended to support AI agents as travel applications move from planning and recommendations towards completing transactions. The new funding will be used to secure larger supplier credit facilities, support higher booking volumes and expand the company’s white-label model into traditional travel markets. It will also support the launch of a stablecoin-enabled financial layer for settlement, treasury management and working-capital financing.

Cybersecurity startup Cytix has raised $7 million in Series A funding to accelerate the rollout of its change risk management platform and expand adoption among enterprise and regulated organisations. The round was led by Northern Gritstone, with participation from existing investors Auriga Cyber Ventures and NPIF II – PXN Equity Finance, managed by PXN Ventures as part of the Northern Powerhouse Investment Fund II. Cytix is addressing security challenges created by the growing pace of software development, as AI-assisted coding, agentic workflows and continuous delivery increase the volume and frequency of software changes. The company argues that traditional security approaches, which largely focus on identifying vulnerabilities, provide limited visibility into the business risk associated with individual changes. According to research cited by Cytix, 62 per cent of security leaders believe security risk within their organisations is shifting from a latent issue to an immediate one, while 38 per cent strongly agree that their organisation is prepared for the volume of AI-generated code entering its environment. Software is changing. AI-assisted development means change now happens at machine speed. Meanwhile, very few security leaders have control over, or understanding of, those changes from a risk perspective. Right now, existing tools can tell you what vulnerabilities you have, but can’t tell you about the risk. We launched Cytix’ change risk management platform to get control of that risk, said Ben Armstrong, CEO of Cytix. Cytix's platform is designed to help organisations assess the security implications of software changes as they occur. It continuously monitors software changes and updates, analyses the risks they introduce, determines the appropriate security response and validates how those risks have been addressed. It also creates evidence showing how individual changes were handled, supporting regulatory and compliance requirements. The platform operates between a customer's software development lifecycle, where changes are made, and its risk, security and compliance functions. By providing a central control point for software changes, Cytix aims to give security teams visibility into what has changed, the associated business risk and the actions taken in response. The Series A funding will support the rollout of the platform as Cytix targets enterprise customers and organisations operating in regulated industries where software change governance is a compliance requirement. Customers can access the platform directly from Cytix or through its managed service partnerships with NCC Group and KPMG.