Early-stage venture capital firm Arāya Ventures is accelerating its expansion into the GCC region through a strategy focused on new on-the-ground leadership, locally anchored investment platforms, and a practical investor education initiative. The firm stated a sustained commitment to investing in Saudi Arabia, where it aims to support early-stage innovation and attract global capital.
FemTech startup Unfabled out of London has just raised an additional €1.4 million for their women’s health platform, as well as expanding into 737 Boots stores across the UK – bringing total Seed funding to just over €3.3 million.
The Enterprise Investment Scheme Association (EISA) has announced the winners of the 2025 EISA Awards at the House of Lords, Westminster. Celebrating the very best in the Enterprise Investment Scheme (EIS) and Seed Enterprise Investment Scheme (SEIS) ecosystem, the awards bring together entrepreneurs, investors, legal experts and financial advisers and more to recognise the excellence made possible by the schemes.
Arāya Ventures is an investment group born out of the idea that founders from all backgrounds should be able to access capital and support. The London-based venture capital firm backs companies at the earliest stages and prides itself on working closely with its portfolio founders.
The firm has its own angel academy, which trains women to become investors. Europe’s crowd of solo GPs has been gradually growing over the last few years — and exited entrepreneur Rupa Popat is one of the latest to join the pack. Her London-based firm Araya Ventures has raised £18.2m of its first fund, targeting a final close of £20m in May, twice the size she originally aimed for.
Founder & Managing Partner Rupa Popat announces Arāya Ventures has completed a second close of the Arāya Super Angel Fund at £18.2million and received a milestone £5 million commitment from British Business Investments, a subsidiary of the British Business Bank, co-investing alongside the Arāya Super Angel Fund.
Arāya Ventures has completed a second close of the Arāya Super Angel Fund at £18.2 million and received £5 million commitment from British Business Investments, a subsidiary of the British Business Bank, co-investing alongside the Arāya Super Angel Fund.
Founder & Managing Partner Rupa Popat announces Arāya Ventures has completed a second close of the Arāya Super Angel Fund at £18.2million and received a milestone £5 million commitment from British Business Investments, a subsidiary of the British Business Bank, co-investing alongside the Arāya Super Angel Fund. The community-powered fund which will invest in up to 60 innovative pre-seed and seed stage primarily UK startups across the next four years that are transforming the way we live and work across Health, FinTech, Commerce and Future of Work.
London-based VC Araya Ventures has secured an oversubscribed $23 million in a second close for its Super Angel Fund, targeting a final close of $25 million in May. British Business Investments is among the investors.
Arāya Ventures, a London-based venture capital firm, has recently made waves in the UK startup ecosystem with the announcement of its debut fund. The Arāya Super Angel Fund has successfully completed its second close, securing £18.2 million in total funding. This milestone achievement includes a significant £5 million commitment from British Business Investments, a subsidiary of the British Business Bank.
Araya Ventures has completed a second close of the Araya Super Angel Fund at £18.2million and received a milestone £5 million commitment from British Business Investments, a subsidiary of the British Business Bank, co-investing alongside the Araya Super Angel Fund.
Solo GPs are reshaping Europe’s venture landscape, bridging the gap between angel investors and institutions. This month, in the European Women in VC, we dive into their evolving role in the VC ecosystem.
Amber Hill spent 14 years as a medical researcher. She didn’t mind the work, but there was one thing she consistently hated: administrative tasks.
“I think most people do, especially in research,” she told TechCrunch. She would rather be analyzing data or building relationships with patients, she said. “But I was spending so much time doing manual tasks that didn’t require any medical expertise. It’s a process that’s completely broken, and I knew it could be fixed.”
Bloom Money has blossomed into a vital platform for UK diaspora communities, helping users save, build credit, and manage their finances with confidence.
Europe’s later-stage fintechs continue to be a crucial training ground for the next generation of entrepreneurs and typically dominate lists of “founder factories”. According to a recent report by VC firm Accel and data platform Dealroom, Europe’s seventy fintech unicorns have produced 423 startups including Sync Savings founded by former employees.
Lapse, a three-year-old photo-sharing app, announced it raised $30 million in Series A funding from a group of prominent venture-capital firms and angel investors led by Greylock and DST Global Partners. Greylock general partner Jacob Andreou, a former Snap executive, joined Lapse’s board.
Emperia, a London-base metaverse startup that develops virtual stores for fashion brands, has raised $10m (£8m) in a Series A funding round. Founded in 2019, Emperia creates virtual storefronts to simulate physical shopping experiences when purchasing art and fashion products. It has worked with brands including Lacoste, Dior Beauty and Sunglass Hut.
Anna Brailsford wants Code First Girls to become the world’s first edtech unicorn dedicated to women. She was inspired by the fact that the UK’s tech job market is projected to grow to six times its current value to be worth £30 billion by 2025. And the second was that only one in five people in the current tech workforce are women.
London-based hiring intelligence platform Screenloop — which offers candidate sourcing, interview analysis and reference automation — has raised $7m in seed funding led by Stride VC.
Let’s be honest, when it comes to female founders or people of color fundraising, it’s always been hard. It doesn’t matter if we are in the middle of a tech renaissance or in a market downturn, if you are a woman, a BIPOC founder, an LGBTQIA+ founder, or a founder with a disability, you’ll kiss a lot of frogs before you get that cheque.
The global influencer and entrepreneur talks to Vogue about a life led by ayurveda, her inspirations, and the journey ahead for indē wild in India. The first Indian beauty brand to launch in four countries within nine months.
is the continuing low proportion of female angel investors, which limits the pool of equity capital available to support entrepreneurial growth and innovation. Notably, our research and experience has shown that growing the number of female angels will directly increase the level of investment in female entrepreneurs
Includes two of our portfolio companies; Yuty and Sojo. The new fund will be invested across 40 startups, one third of which are led by women. The Google team says they screened 700 startups from 18 countries in Europe and met with 120 of them, before whittling the cohort down to the final 40.
London-based Your Juno has raised $2.2 million funding to close the gender gap in financial education and make it inclusive and accessible
London-based femtech startup The Lowdown has closed a $2.5 million seed round to supercharge its community-centered female health platform. The round is led by Speedinvest who is joining existing investors Nina Capital, Calm/Storm VC, Entrepreneur First (which program first backed the company in 2020), and four Atomico Angels.
The 28-year-old founder of Jude, Peony Li is smashing one of Britain’s biggest taboos to bring bladder care into the mainstream conversation
With individuals and teams transitioning to a fully remote or hybrid working models, post-pandemic, there’s a theory that employees still desire the structure and accountability that working in an office used to provide. Not everyone likes working remotely full-time, right? There’s a lack of “community”. Plus, sometimes it’s hard to get into state of “deep work”.
Early-stage investor Ada Ventures has reached a first close of £36m for its second fund that will target early-stage startups focusing on areas including climate, healthcare, ageing and economic empowerment.
The 33-year-old entrepreneur is betting she can bring together another underrated duo — consumer brands and crypto. Her latest venture uses blockchain technology to help brands build customer loyalty without having to reply on buying up pricey ads on third-party social media platforms.
Trumpet, a B2B sales platform used by companies such as Google, has raised £1.6m in a pre-seed funding round led by Lightbird Ventures. The London-based startup said it will use the capital to increase its headcount and prepare for international growth.
Global retailer Sunglass Hut is partnering with virtual reality technology developer Emperia — creating a virtual reality store called “Sunglass Hut Utopia.” The virtual store features a gaming moment and try-on technology, showcasing six exclusive products.
Founders Heinin Zhang and Siddhi Mittal created the startup Yhangry before the pandemic, which lets people order a made-to-measure dinner party online. They have now raised $1.5 million seed round from notable angels, including UK VCs as well as a Made in Chelsea star.
British supermarket group Asda said it had made an equity investment in digital food service start up Lean Kitchen Network (LKN), the latest collaboration of a partnership strategy partly designed to repurpose excess space at its stores.
