The British Business Bank has increased its commitment to Empirical Ventures by £10 million, bringing its total support for the specialist deeptech investor to £15 million.

The funding, provided through the Regional Angels Programme, is intended to support Empirical Ventures’ investments in science-led start-ups across the UK. The firm focuses on founders it calls “venture scientists” – researchers and technical specialists seeking to commercialise work in areas including energy, advanced materials and life sciences.

The additional commitment will allow Empirical Ventures to make larger pre-seed and seed-stage investments. The firm backs businesses built on scientific or engineering breakthroughs, with a portfolio spanning AI and computing, quantum, biotech, climate technology and robotics.

The deal aligns with the British Business Bank’s efforts to address funding gaps for smaller businesses outside London. The Regional Angels Programme is designed to increase the supply of early-stage equity finance for firms with growth potential across the UK’s nations and regions.

Funding gap

Deeptech has become a growing focus for public and private investors as the UK looks to turn more of its research base into commercial businesses. Companies emerging from laboratories and universities often face longer development cycles and higher technical risk than software start-ups, making early backing harder to secure.

Empirical Ventures argues that specialist investors are needed because many scientists lack access to backers who understand the technical and commercial path from research to market. Its approach centres on founders with deep expertise in a specific field, rather than entrepreneurs with broader operating backgrounds.

Mark Barry, Senior Investment Director at British Business Bank, said: “We are delighted to expand our commitment to Empirical Ventures. Their team has identified a powerful untapped resource in the UK economy: the ‘Venture Scientist’. By backing technical founders who are solving hard problems, Empirical is helping to bridge the critical funding gap for science-led businesses outside London. This partnership ensures that the UK’s brightest scientific minds have the support they need to turn research into category-defining global companies.”

The investment also reflects wider policy interest in sectors such as deeptech and life sciences. The announcement linked the commitment to the government’s industrial strategy, with an emphasis on commercialising research and supporting regional economic activity tied to high-skilled jobs.

Science focus

Empirical Ventures is a UK-based fund specialising in pre-seed and seed investment in deep science companies. It says it is led by PhD-trained operators and investors and seeks to back companies built around fundamental scientific and engineering advances.

Its investment thesis is that some of the most valuable future businesses will be created by founders with direct domain expertise who can operate at the intersection of research and commerce. That focus distinguishes it from generalist early-stage funds, which may prioritise consumer internet or software-led business models with shorter paths to revenue.

Dr Johnathan Matlock, Co-Founder and General Partner at Empirical Ventures, said the new funding would help the firm invest with greater conviction in scientific founders across regional centres.

“The greatest companies of the next 30 years will be built by scientists. We call them ‘Venture Scientists’ – founders who bring rigorous scientific methodology to company building. But for too long, these founders have been underestimated or misunderstood by generalist investors. This £10 million commitment from the British Business Bank allows us to back these Venture Scientists with the conviction they deserve. Whether they are in Bristol, Manchester or Edinburgh, we are here to ensure that the founders capable of rewriting the rules of what’s possible get the resources to do so,” Matlock said.

The British Business Bank’s core programmes support £23 billion of finance to almost 64,000 smaller businesses, underscoring the scale of public intervention in the UK market for early-stage and growth funding.

ICS.AI has launched an AI-based local government reorganisation product for councils in England, aimed at cutting transition time by up to 30% as authorities prepare for the move to new unitary councils.

The launch comes as England’s two-tier council structure is due to be replaced by single authorities. Around 200 county and district councils are set to be abolished and replaced by unitary authorities. The change will affect 20 million residents, and newly formed councils must be fully operational by April 2028.

That timetable gives councils two years to combine workforces, policies, data and technology systems into new organisations. Comparable reorganisations have historically taken five years, putting pressure on local authorities to complete more of the integration work before the new bodies formally begin operating.

Tight Timetable

The product, called SMART: Day One LGR Accelerator, is aimed at local government teams managing the transition. It focuses on four areas that often consume significant time in council mergers: resident contact services, workforce planning, transition oversight and the reshaping of legacy technology estates.

For resident services, the software is intended to create a single point of contact across phone, web and digital channels before the new authority goes live. The goal is to resolve differences in terminology, policy and back-end systems across merging councils in advance, rather than relying on a public-facing layer over older processes.

For workforce planning, the product automates data gathering and reconciliation across merging councils, allowing transition teams to model the target workforce structure earlier. It also includes what ICS.AI calls an LGR Command Workbench for programme oversight and an AI Application Forge intended to extract functions from legacy systems into a consolidated environment before vesting day.

The backdrop is a reorganisation programme under significant financial pressure. ICS.AI said the cost of local government reorganisation is estimated at more than £30 million for each area, while government capacity funding is less than £1 million per area.

Lessons From Mergers

Past reorganisations have shown the risks of leaving deeper systems integration until after launch. In earlier council mergers, public-facing services such as websites, phone numbers and branding were often ready on day one, but the internal systems and processes behind them remained fragmented for years.

ICS.AI cited Somerset Council as an example of the complexity facing transition teams as they combined organisations with different systems, cultures and working practices while working to a fixed political deadline. According to the company, those conditions meant many of the more difficult tasks could only begin once the new authority was already live.

The company argues that the same structural issues now apply across England, but on a shorter timetable. That has implications not only for technology integration, but also for financial control, governance and service continuity during the handover.

Governance Issue

ICS.AI also highlighted a separate challenge around the use of artificial intelligence inside councils during the reorganisation process. It said staff are already turning to consumer AI tools to manage additional workloads alongside their existing duties, raising concerns about controls, auditability and data handling at a time when accuracy matters.

Its approach includes an AI Target Operating Model intended to provide governance from the start of the programme and keep AI use controlled and auditable during transition work.

Martin Neale, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of ICS.AI, said: “Previous reorganisation council teams did extraordinary work under enormous pressure, but they were limited to standing up the ‘basics’ for day one and leaving the deep integration for afterwards. That’s what drove years of remediation cost and service disruption. AI changes the equation. It lets councils do in weeks what previously took years. But the window is the transition itself. If councils wait until after vesting day, they’ll face the same multi-year, multi-million pound integration challenge as their predecessors. Only with less time and less money to fix it.”

Beyond the reorganisation product, ICS.AI said its platform has been used by Derby City Council to identify £12 million in savings. It also said it has handled 2.9 million resident enquiries for the authority, with a 56% call deflection rate and a 94% reduction in misdirected calls.

The company added that it provides AI front-door deployments for 62% of UK councils that have adopted that model, giving it a sizeable footprint in the local government market as authorities face a compressed and costly restructuring process.

Quadient has signed a collaboration with Lush UK to automate the retailer’s accounts payable operations. The project centres on Lush’s use of Quadient’s software alongside Xero.

Lush handles thousands of supplier invoices each month across its UK business. The retailer says the change has cut the time needed to process non-purchase-order invoices from 10 minutes to 4 minutes, while purchase-order invoices now take 2 to 3 minutes with automated approvals.

The system processes more than 4,000 invoices a month on a single platform. Previously, Lush used a mix of invoice processing and approval systems across its UK entities, forcing finance staff to switch between platforms and manually post invoices into accounting systems after approval.

That setup slowed processing and added manual work. The new arrangement brings invoice capture, validation, approval and posting into one platform integrated with Xero, which Lush has been standardising across its finance systems.

Finance shift

The move reflects a broader push among retail finance teams to automate routine back-office work as transaction volumes rise. Accounts payable has become a common target for software investment because it often still relies on manual data entry, disconnected approval chains and separate accounting tools.

For Lush, the implementation also addresses Goods Received Not Invoiced reporting, a finance control that tracks stock delivered but not yet billed by suppliers. The system gives finance teams a clearer way to track invoices through capture and approval while reducing manual intervention.

“We needed a scalable, reliable solution for complex accounts payable. Quadient’s seamless Xero integration and automation strengthened our workflows and efficiency, consolidating multiple systems and positioning us for growth,” said Mike West, Finance Director at Lush.

Quadient’s software includes purchase-order matching, custom workflows and automated data extraction. In practice, those functions are designed to reduce the need for staff to rekey information and shorten approval times for routine invoices.

Retail pressure

Retailers face particular pressure in accounts payable due to large supplier networks, frequent stock movements, and high invoice volumes. Finance teams also have to balance speed with control, especially where different legal entities or store operations have built up separate systems over time.

Lush, which is based in Poole, used the rollout as part of a wider finance standardisation around Xero. By linking accounts payable more closely to the accounting platform, the retailer aimed to simplify the path from invoice receipt to posting.

Quadient is one of many software providers targeting financial automation, an area attracting interest from businesses looking to reduce manual workloads and tighten governance. The market has expanded as cloud accounting systems have become more common and businesses seek better integration between front-end workflows and finance ledgers.

Stephanie Auchabie, Senior Vice President, Digital Sales, Partners and Customer Success for Europe at Quadient, said companies are increasingly focused on linking automation with finance system integration.

“As organisations modernise their finance operations, automation and system integration are becoming critical to improving efficiency, control and scalability,” said Auchabie. “By integrating seamlessly with Xero, Quadient AP enables finance teams to move away from fragmented, manual processes and toward a more intelligent, automated accounts payable workflow. We are delighted to support Lush as they standardise their finance systems and create a more streamlined, data-driven approach to managing supplier transactions.”