Eight partnerships have been selected as Robotics Adoption Hubs under a £40 million programme to help businesses and public services deploy robotics. They include the SHARP surgical robotics hub, Lincoln’s HARVEST agri-food hub and hubs serving manufacturing, waste and recycling, and robotics in public spaces. Support will include feasibility work, demonstrations, training and advice on choosing and integrating equipment. The announcement allocates support to named partnerships; the hoped-for gains in productivity and patient recovery remain outcomes to be demonstrated.
UK-headquartered Universal Quantum has secured over US$100 million in a Series A round co-led by DCVC and Firgun Ventures. The funding will support development and commercialisation of its modular quantum-computing systems and international expansion.
UKRI and government partners have committed more than £54 million to 18 research and innovation projects on epidemic preparedness, antimicrobial resistance and veterinary vaccines. The funded work includes tree-disease resilience, outbreak-risk assessment and animal-vaccine platforms. This is a coordinated funding award to named projects; it does not establish clinical benefit, vaccine approval or deployment of the proposed technologies.
King’s College London and the Royal Veterinary College have developed a canine DNA database that helps identify dogs involved in crimes. The team reports that two police forces have already used its analysis in investigations, including an attack on an officer. Applying the method to shed hairs is a possible next step, rather than a demonstrated use.
UK researchers have demonstrated organic materials combining two-photon absorption with circularly polarised delayed light emission, reported in Nature Communications. The result advances experimental imaging materials; deep-tissue scanning and clinical use remain potential applications.
London-based voice AI company ElevenLabs has closed a $300 million employee share sale valuing it at $22 billion, twice its February valuation. Wellington and T. Rowe Price led the tender. The company says its conversational agents now handle more than 15 million conversations a week, three times the February level. The transaction provides shareholder liquidity; it is not new company fundraising.
The relaunched Catapult supports AI hardware and defence companies through engineering, integration, testing and validation at its Newport, Bristol and Glasgow laboratories. The national programme builds on existing facilities. Further silicon and system-integration capabilities will be developed in phases; their launch is not claimed here.
University of Bath researchers have demonstrated fluorescent probes that track glucose in cultured cells and living zebrafish, including fish with impaired insulin production. The work provides a tool for studying glucose metabolism. It has not established clinical benefit in humans or a new diagnostic treatment.
A new 85-metre research vessel is planned for Cefas, accommodating more than 40 people and supporting marine science and environmental monitoring. The government says it will be built in Britain and is expected to become operational in 2031 or 2032. Procurement and shipyard selection remain ahead.
The government committed £115m for a new marine research vessel to replace Cefas Endeavour, with construction reserved for a UK shipyard. The vessel is expected to be up to 85 metres long and enter service in the early 2030s; the yard has not yet been chosen.
London-headquartered Basecamp Research closed an oversubscribed $140 million Series C round led by S32. The company says the financing will train a new generation of its EDEN biological AI models and advance its preclinical pipeline of AI-designed therapeutics towards clinical development.
The specialist campus has opened on the Airbus site in Filton. Nearly 800 apprentices were due to begin training in its first week, supported by a partnership of four colleges.