British Business Bank commits £10M to Odyssey Ventures to back UK AI and deeptech founders

The British Business Bank has written a £10 million check to Odyssey Ventures, a transatlantic outfit that spends its time hunting for AI and deeptech founders in Britain and trying to keep them British-based while they grow. The money comes through the Bank's Regional Angels Programme and will sit alongside Odyssey's own early-stage vehicle, Odyssey Discovery I, a $50 million fund aimed squarely at seed and pre-seed deals.

The reasoning behind the move is less about generosity and more about arithmetic. Europe's startups have missed out on more than $375 billion in funding compared to the US between 2015 and 2024, according to figures cited by the Bank, and UK companies routinely get valued well below their American counterparts doing similar work. That gap doesn't just sting egos. It pushes founders to relocate, sell early, or simply run out of runway before they can compete with better-funded Silicon Valley rivals.

Odyssey Discovery I is chasing exactly the kind of companies that get squeezed by that dynamic — those working across applied AI and automation, energy and sustainable industry, and human and planetary health. The fund is already half closed, with backing from Thema among other institutional investors, and Odyssey expects to wrap up fundraising after the summer. Mark Barry of the British Business Bank framed the £10 million as a way to pair UK innovation with real access to San Francisco, rather than watching good ideas drift toward acquirers or accelerators overseas.

Ali Mitchell, who runs Odyssey as Managing Partner, put it more bluntly: British founders are producing some of the best AI and deeptech work in the world, but too many lose momentum before they get a fair shot against cash-rich American competitors. Her pitch is that Odyssey exists to close that exact gap — giving founders capital, US customers, and operational help from the earliest stage rather than after they've already lost ground.