VC Directory

PRE-SEED VCs in Uk Directory

Curated index of active venture capital funds investing in Europe and Israel. Track partners, stages, and check sizes.

Ada Ventures

London, GB

Ada Ventures focuses on pre-seed investments in European founders building businesses for a better human future. They aim to find and fund the "Ada Lovelaces of today," prioritizing founder qualities over traditional metrics like CV, past work experience, or gut feel. The firm is committed to inclusive VC, seeking out founders who may be overlooked by more conventional investors due to their backgrounds or networks. They lead >70% of investments and integrate impact assessment into every investment decision. Their AI-Powered Pitch Deck Analysis tool, "Deck Genius", also demonstrates a commitment to supporting founders.

Pre-seed, SeedHealthcareFuture of Work

Araya Ventures

London, GB
A

Invests in exceptional founders globally at pre-seed and seed stages across AI, healthcare, commerce, fintech, and the future of work. Focuses on high-conviction opportunities domestically and globally, with dedicated funds for women-led startups in healthcare, climate, fintech, and deeptech/AI.

Pre-Seed and SeedExceptional founders globally

Cambridge University

Cambridge, GB

Based on the crawled website content, it is challenging to formulate a traditional venture capital investment thesis for the University of Cambridge. The website primarily focuses on academic programs (undergraduate, postgraduate, professional), research activities, and university administration. While there is a 'Business and Enterprise' section, the provided excerpts do not delve into specific investment strategies, target sectors, or financial vehicles. The university's emphasis is on education, research, and public engagement, with a business and enterprise arm which may oversee commercialisation of research through licensing deals, spin outs or technology transfer, as well as partnering with businesses. It is likely that any investment activity occurs through a separate entity or fund associated with the university, which is not revealed within the available scraped pages. It can be assumed that the University likely engages with or supports the commercialisation of research outcomes, potentially involving investment or funding in spin-out companies arising from university research. Based on this assumption, an investment thesis could broadly be around supporting innovation and entrepreneurship stemming from Cambridge University's research base, targeting deep-tech companies or ventures with strong intellectual property and societal impact. However, without further information on a related fund, this remains highly speculative. The overall impression is that the University's site content concentrates on academia, student life, research endeavors, and community outreach, making it problematic to extract meaningful investment information, strategies or goals from this limited data. It is likely that the university would engage with separate investors to commercialize research outcomes rather than investing directly into ventures.

Potentially pre-seed, seed (highly speculative)Potentially deep techscience

Connect Ventures

London, GB

Connect Ventures focuses on backing exceptional founders building outlier product companies. The firm emphasizes a product-centric approach, prioritizing companies with strong developer experience and a deep understanding of their users' needs. They aim to be more than just investors, positioning themselves as long-term partners who understand the intricacies of building product-led businesses. They seek founders building solutions to problems they personally experience, leading to innovative products that resonate with a wider audience. Connect Ventures looks for companies where they can establish a high level of trust and alignment with the founders, acting as a sounding board and accountability partner throughout their journey. The firm's investment strategy is to lead or co-lead pre-seed and seed rounds, providing crucial early-stage funding and support. They understand the importance of product development and community-led growth, particularly in areas like marketplaces, market networks, and networked SaaS. The partners have experience as founders themselves, providing firsthand understanding of the challenges and opportunities that startups face. The firm actively supports their portfolio companies with fundraising strategies and leadership development. Connect Ventures places high importance on the founder's journey and their ability to create impactful products. The quotes from portfolio founders highlight Connect's understanding of product, commitment through thick and thin, and willingness to be hands-on when needed. Their investment decisions are driven by a belief in the power of product to drive growth and category domination, and they actively experiment with new frameworks like Minimum Viable Category Design to help their portfolio companies succeed.

Pre-Seed, SeedAIDeep Tech

Daring Capital

GB

Daring Capital invests in extraordinary underrepresented founders building companies that make the world a better place. They focus on mission-led startups often overlooked by traditional investors due to lack of track record or access to wealthy networks. The firm emphasizes transparency, agility, and founder-centric support to drive impact and profitability.

Early-stage (pre-seed to seed)Early-stage companies founded by underrepresented individuals solving real-world problemswith a focus on social impact and mission-driven innovation.

Deuce Capital

London, GB
D

Deuce Capital invests in pre-seed and seed stage HealthTech businesses based in the United Kingdom. They bring operator experience and network to mentor founders, and help them turn their visions into scalable, impactful businesses.

SeedHealthTech

Entrée Capital

London, GB

Entrée Capital is a venture capital firm managing $1.5 billion across several funds, with offices in Tel Aviv, London, and New York. They focus on partnering with exceptional founders to build innovative companies addressing meaningful challenges. Their investment strategy targets early-stage investments, specifically pre-seed, seed, and Series A rounds, across Israel, the UK, Europe, and the US. The firm seeks companies in AI, Deep-Tech & Quantum Computing, Software, Data & B2B Productivity, Crypto infrastructure and security, and "Weird Is Wonderful" frontier innovation. Entrée Capital aims to invest in companies that are building the impossible and disrupting traditional industries. The firm emphasizes a founder-centric approach, standing with entrepreneurs from day zero and supporting them throughout their journey. They prioritize companies demonstrating strong product-market fit, data-driven decision-making, and the potential for significant impact. The firm believes that AI is a foundational transformation of the global economy and focuses on AI-native founders building vertical agents, infrastructure, and category-defining software. They also recognize the convergence of physics, compute, software, and national-security innovation. Entrée Capital is particularly interested in verticals often overlooked due to smaller software budgets but ripe for disruption through AI-driven solutions. They are proactive about engaging with potential portfolio companies, showcasing examples of direct outreach and early engagement that led to customer adoption and, eventually, investment. They appear to value companies that create systems of context, move beyond simply organizing work, and embrace autonomous agents capable of completing tasks, differentiating themselves from systems of record.

Pre-seed, Seed, Series AArtificial IntelligenceDeep-Tech & Quantum Computing

Female Founders Fund

GB

Founders Forum Group is a global community and group of businesses empowering entrepreneurs at every stage of their journeys. They champion entrepreneurial innovation and prioritize the needs of founders through networking & events, education, professional services, investment, and philanthropy. The group's vision is to create an environment for collaboration among founders, investors, CEOs, and leaders to discuss the future of tech-enabled industries, new technologies, and evolving business models. The organization convenes invitation-only forums in various locations to unite successful founders, thought leaders, and investors to address significant questions. They aim to be key drivers of the startup ecosystem, enabling connections, deal-making, and supporting entrepreneurs through various stages of their company lifecycle, from pre-seed to post-exit.

Pre-seed to post-exit

Founders Forum Group

GB

Founders Forum Group (FFG) operates as a global community and a group of businesses aimed at empowering entrepreneurs across all stages of their journey. Their core strategy revolves around building and leveraging a peer-to-peer network of inspiring founders, pioneering investors, inventive CEOs, and impactful leaders. FFG facilitates connections, knowledge sharing, and deal-making through invitation-only forums held in iconic locations worldwide, addressing critical questions facing the tech industry. They are not solely an investment firm but provide investment opportunities, educational programs, professional services, and philanthropic initiatives. They aim to be key drivers of the startup ecosystem and provide opportunities for making friends, doing deals, and celebrating life, according to testimonials on their website. The group focuses on creating an environment where founders can openly discuss challenges and build relationships that can lead to business transactions. They support entrepreneurs from pre-seed to post-exit, evidenced by the range of services and businesses within the Founders Forum Group ecosystem, including venture studios, seed programs, and accelerator programs through Founders Factory. Their geographical footprint spans across Europe, Asia, North America, and the Middle East, Africa, and South Asia (MEASA). They also highlight specific locations such as London, Los Angeles, Rio de Janeiro, Tel Aviv, Mumbai, Paris, and Hong Kong. FFG also operates London Tech Week through a joint venture and spearheaded the relaunch of Tech Nation. They operate multiple sub-businesses and events and support entrepreneurs with a variety of needs. Their approach combines networking events, early-stage investment (through Founders Factory and firstminute capital), and community building to create a comprehensive platform for entrepreneurial success. The quotes from founders in various stages and industries emphasize the impact of the network on their journey and how it acts as a place where business relationships and deals are fostered. They aim to be more than just investors, as they also prioritize building relationships and supporting the personal and professional growth of their members.

Pre-seed, Seed, Early-stageTechnologyTech-enabled industries

Kindred Ventures

London, GB

Based on the provided context, Kindred Ventures has launched Fund III with $130M to invest in tech startups at the pre-seed stage. Their strategy involves backing innovative companies at the earliest stages of development.

Pre-SeedTech Startups

LYVA Labs

Liverpool, GB

LYVA Labs drives economic growth through innovation by supporting startups and SMEs in health, life sciences, clean tech, and deep tech. Focuses on pre-seed investment, incubation, acceleration, and grant-funded innovation programs to foster scalable, impactful solutions within Liverpool City Region.

Pre-seed, early-stage, and established SMEsPre-seed investmentearly-stage support

Launchbay Capital

London, GB

Launchbay Capital focuses on fostering innovation and liquidity within the technology sector through a combination of secondary investments and direct investment opportunities. They aim to provide essential investments and expertise by leveraging an actively managed secondary growth fund that focuses on high-liquidity investments in growth-stage venture-backed tech companies. Furthermore, they facilitate direct investment access to leading global technology companies in the private markets via the Launchbay investment platform (LBX.pro), also offering tokenized growth equity opportunities. The firm is committed to sourcing attractive deals and scaling businesses from the initial stages of product-market fit, while also designing investment structures that facilitate liquidity windows and capital redistribution. Their approach involves leveraging data analysis to understand the underlying fundamentals of venture businesses, coupled with deep investment expertise to execute deals across all investment stages. Launchbay Capital emphasizes a long-term investment horizon, focusing on risk management strategies that enable investment teams to remain agile and resilient throughout various market cycles. They provide access to curated, tokenized private equity portfolios across transformative industries, offering fractional ownership and simplified investment access. The firm invests across the full venture value chain, providing multiple investment solutions including direct platform opportunities, fund structures, secondaries, and select partnerships with specialized pre-seed and seed VC managers. They appear to have a global outlook and a diverse team, with partners bringing multi-country investment experience, a strong track record, and a broad industry network. Launchbay Capital believes that collaboration and engagement are critical to navigating increasing investment complexities.

Early Stage, Growth Stage, Secondaries, Pre-Seed, SeedAI & Machine LearningFintech

Local Globe Latitude

London, GB

Based on the limited information available, LocalGlobe Latitude positions itself as a long-term partner for founders, focusing on pre-seed and seed stages. They appear to invest across various sectors, with a portfolio including companies in fintech, insurance, travel, and real estate. Their investment strategy seems to involve both LocalGlobe and Latitude funds, suggesting a possible tiered investment approach based on stage or geography. From their portfolio companies, they may prioritize companies with strong growth potential and innovative solutions. The 'Live at Phoenix Court' section indicates a focus on community and providing value through events and networking.

Pre-seed, SeedFintechInsurance

LocalGlobe VC

London, GB

Based on the website content provided, LocalGlobe positions itself as a "trusted long-term partner for founders from pre-seed and seed." While a comprehensive investment thesis isn't explicitly stated, the firm seems to prioritize early-stage investments with a focus on providing ongoing support and building lasting relationships with the companies they back. Their involvement in multiple companies across diverse sectors suggests an opportunistic approach within their defined stage and geographic preferences. They also appear to have a strong network, as evidenced by the co-investors they work with and the events they host.

Pre-seed, SeedFinance & PaymentsTravel & Hospitality

Onstage

London, GB

Onstage operates an events ecosystem aimed at simplifying the fundraising journey for startups and VCs. Their primary event, Demo Day, occurs bi-annually and is designed to connect pre-seed to Series A startups with over 300 leading VC funds. The process involves a streamlined application, VC introductions, the announcement of the Onstage Top 100, and a live Demo Day in London where the top 1% of applicants pitch. All applicants get exposure to VCs. Onstage also hosts "Deploy," an in-person summit for emerging and established venture fund managers to pitch their funds to a curated group of LPs. Onstage emphasizes efficiency, meritocracy, transparency, and collaboration in the startup ecosystem, aiming to provide an equal playing field for founders and funders and perfect information to all stakeholders.

Pre-seed, Seed, Series A

Oxford Capital

Oxford, GB

Oxford Capital is a venture capital firm based in Oxford, UK, that invests in early-stage and growth-stage companies across the UK. They focus on backing founders of innovative companies with disruptive potential, investing from pre-seed to growth and beyond. With over 25 years of experience, they have invested over £500m into over 100 companies. The firm provides individuals, families, and institutions the ability to participate in these investment opportunities. Oxford Capital aims to bridge the gap between entrepreneurs and private capital investors. The firm's strategy involves supporting companies from their earliest stages to later growth, enabling entrepreneurial successes. They are particularly interested in companies leveraging technology and science to solve complex problems. The firm's investment approach emphasizes backing companies that are creating new markets or disrupting existing ones. Oxford Capital looks for founders with a clear vision, strong execution capabilities, and the potential to build large, scalable businesses. They also focus on providing value beyond capital, offering support in areas such as strategy, operations, and fundraising. Oxford Capital actively monitors the venture capital landscape, providing commentary on industry trends and investment policy through its news and views section. They support the Enterprise Investment Scheme (EIS) as a means to encourage investment in early-stage companies. The firm has a strong emphasis on governance and sustainability in both mature and high-growth companies.

Pre-seed, Seed, Series A, GrowthTechnologyScience

Seedcamp

London, GB

Seedcamp partners with Europe’s most exceptional tech founders from Day One. They aim to identify and nurture the continent’s most promising entrepreneurs with the grit and vision to reshape the future. Seedcamp provides founders and their teams access to an unparalleled network, unfiltered advice, and unwavering support throughout their company-building journeys. With almost two decades at the heart of Europe’s tech ecosystem, Seedcamp has established a strong reputation for early-stage investment. They look for founders who are building the future, taking a chance on teams even when others might deem their ideas crazy. Seedcamp emphasizes long-term partnership, providing ongoing support from their internal team and global network.

Day One (pre-seed and seed)Technologyvarious sectors (as indicated by portfolio companies)

Seraphim Accelerator

London, GB

Seraphim VC is a global leader in SpaceTech investment, focusing on companies solving the world’s greatest problems. They invest in the brightest minds and smartest ideas to provide trailblazing, high-value solutions that disrupt, transform, and improve life. Their mission is to accelerate humanity’s next giant leap by transforming science fiction into science fact. They support space entrepreneurship from inception to exit, providing capital, expertise, and global partners. Seraphim backs pioneering space and deeptech ventures at the forefront of global security, sustainability, and resilience. Their portfolio companies redefine how critical infrastructure is protected, defense capabilities are strengthened, and pressing global challenges are tackled, including real-time Earth observation, secure communications, and climate intelligence. They aim to harness the power of space to build the next generation of game-changing companies. Their interconnected model is designed to identify, support, and grow early-stage SpaceTech companies across the full lifecycle, from inception to exit. They are backed by leading space corporations and international space agencies across their activities, including investors in their funds like Airbus, SES, Teledyne, and Telespazio, SSTL MDA. They also have accelerator partnerships with the UK and European Space Agency. Their approach generates co-investment opportunities for their LPs at Series B and beyond. Seraphim identifies as “mission control” for Spacetech founders.

Early-stage, Growth-stage, from inception to exit; pre-seed, acceleratorSpaceTechDeepTech

The Phoenix Group/LocalGlobe

London, GB

Based on the crawled website content, The Phoenix Group/LocalGlobe positions itself as a 'trusted long-term partner for founders from pre-seed and seed'. This implies a commitment to early-stage investments and a strategy focused on building lasting relationships with the companies they back. They participate in financing rounds with recognized co-investors. Further research into their website and team pages would be necessary to formulate a comprehensive investment thesis.

Pre-seed, SeedInfrastructureSecurity & Privacy

TrueSight Ventures

London, GB

TrueSight Ventures is a venture capital firm investing in pre-seed and seed stage startups in Europe. The firm focuses on partnering with extraordinary founders who are driven to change the world through technology. They look for ambitious founders targeting large markets and addressing significant problems with technological solutions. TrueSight Ventures supports founding teams by offering advice on strategic decisions, facilitating connections with relevant industry contacts, and assisting in securing subsequent funding rounds. Their approach emphasizes a collaborative partnership with founders, providing them with the resources and guidance necessary to navigate the challenges of early-stage growth. While the website doesn't explicitly state specific metrics or evaluation criteria, the emphasis on 'ambitious founders', 'large markets', and 'important problems' suggests they prioritize startups with significant growth potential and impactful solutions. The firm's presence in both London and Stockholm indicates a strong focus on the European startup ecosystem. They also mention investments across Europe and the US.

Pre-seed, SeedAI/MLBusiness Applications

Unruly Capital

London, GB

Unruly Capital positions itself as a venture capital fund that operates differently, offering transparency through its public web dashboard. The firm seems to have a broad investment mandate, participating in diverse sectors such as Health, BioHealth, and Climate. They are actively deploying capital, having invested $19.6M out of a $23.9M fund across 73 investments. Their investment activity is relatively recent, indicated by the listed transactions up to January 2026. The firm publishes a manifesto that indicates a contrarian and independent spirit. Given the range of co-investors, Unruly Capital is likely willing to participate in syndicated deals with established firms. The data presented indicates an investment approach that is active and responsive to emerging opportunities. The dashboard publicly shares fund statistics, recent transactions, and visual representations of investment categories, investments per quarter, top investment locations, co-investors, and current portfolio companies. This transparency is core to their "doing things differently" approach. Given the sector information available (Climate, BioHealth, Health) and portfolio companies (Beyond Aero, Deep Science Ventures, Renaissance Fusion), it seems the fund has some inclination toward deep tech and impactful ventures. The fund's co-investors are impressive, showing that Unruly Capital is able to attract high-caliber capital allocators. Further research would be needed to flesh out all aspects of the fund's investment strategy.

Not explicitly mentioned, but the average check size suggests seed or pre-seed stage investments.HealthBioHealth

Ahren Innovation Capital

London, GB

Ahren Innovation Capital focuses on investing in deep technology companies that are at the intersection of groundbreaking science and high-end technology. Their investment strategy is geared towards creating outsized returns while also having a positive impact on the world. They back founders with big visions and provide support to help them achieve their goals. They believe in taking asymmetric, considered risks to capture generational opportunities in deep technology. Ahren partners with stellar founders and teams at all stages from pre-seed to pre-IPO, and are willing to help build companies from scratch or provide capital and expertise to high-growth businesses. Their approach involves deep tech expertise from their Founding & Science Partners, who have created technologies with a combined value of over $100BN. They are involved throughout the investment process, from sourcing to deep-tech diligence, and supporting businesses. They offer a Commercial Engine and Unicorn Founder advisors to help their companies achieve success. They also value strategic LP partnerships, where major LPs provide access, expertise, and customers to their portfolio companies. Ahren prioritizes strong values and treating founders well, aiming to be a trusted and respected group that can have a differentiated impact on their success. They aim to add value to exceptional founders at any stage, providing both patient and active capital to empower them to achieve the unimaginable.

Pre-seed, Seed, Series A, Series B, Pre-IPOBrain & AIGenetics & Platform Technologies

Eden Ventures

London, GB

Eden Ventures is an international venture capital firm focused on pre-seed startups, aiming to help founders realize their full potential. They position themselves as the "garden of Eden" for early-stage companies. Their strategy revolves around leveraging a large network of over 500 angels to provide business connections and fundraising opportunities through club deals and connections to VC partners. They seek to invest in teams with serial entrepreneurs, multidisciplinary skills, and strong commitment. The firm offers initial investments up to 100,000 EUR, with flexible financing options including SAFEs, convertible notes, and equity. They prioritize a "founders friendly" approach, acknowledging the challenges and opportunities of building a new business. Eden Ventures is backed by IAG, the main Italian business angel network, which suggests a strong tie to the Italian startup ecosystem and access to angel investors. Their investment criteria include targeting multibillion-dollar markets in hyper-growth sectors with well-defined target customers. They look for deals with the presence of professional investors, a clear roadmap, and defined KPIs, aiming to complete at least 50% of each round. They also mention synergies with the IAG portfolio of 80+ startups and scaleups as a value add. Their overall approach is network-powered, emphasizing connections, strategic advice, and maximizing next round opportunities for their portfolio companies.

Pre-seedcross sectorAI

Entrepreneur First (EF)

London, GB

Entrepreneur First (EF) is a pre-seed investor that focuses on helping individuals find co-founders, develop their ideas, and raise capital. Their primary value proposition is to build unicorn cofounding teams from scratch by providing a structured program that includes matching individuals with complementary skills and behaviors, offering expert advice, and fostering a supportive community. EF supports founders in going from emerging ideas to generating first revenue, with a focus on accelerating their path to building world-class companies. They provide access to advisors, workshops, office space, fundraising support, and Demo Days to help portfolio companies break into top startup ecosystems. EF differentiates itself by investing at the very beginning of the founder journey, often before an idea is fully formed. They provide a curated co-founder matching process which is unique in the venture landscape. The firm also offers extensive support in the U.S. market, including dedicated advisors and a San Francisco Demo Day. Backing from prominent Silicon Valley founders and investors further validates EF's approach and provides credibility to its portfolio companies. The firm's strategy is to identify talented individuals with the potential to become successful founders, regardless of their initial idea or stage. Through their program, EF helps these individuals refine their ideas, build strong teams, and secure funding. By taking a hands-on approach and providing access to a valuable network, EF aims to increase the odds of success for its portfolio companies.

Pre-seedDeep techSaaS