In partnership with

It’s that time again - when we delve into our analytics and find out which startups have been getting the most attention on PreSeed Now over the past 12 months.

As time goes on, some startups drop out of the rolling timeframe and others make their debut in the list. So which of the startups we’ve covered have made it this time?

Let’s find out…

– Martin

Intercom for Startups

Join Intercom’s Early Stage Program to receive a 90% discount.

Get a direct line to your customers. Try the only complete AI-first customer service solution.

Apply now

The 10 startups getting you most excited over the past 12 months

…based on reads and shares on PreSeed Now:

Honu

Could A.I. run an entire economy? That’s the question underpinning Honu’s work with autonomous agents for businesses.

Honu is developing platform-as-a-service infrastructure to power autonomous A.I. agents that can help businesses make better decisions.

“We will be moving towards A.I.-first businesses, which will pave the way to A.I.-first economies… I see a world not very far from today where a non-negligible chunk of GDP is created by highly-autonomous businesses,” founder and CEO Imad Riachi told us.

Location: London

👉 Read more about Honu

MOMO Biotech

Immuno-oncology is a fast-developing field that uses the body’s own immune system to recognise and fight cancer cells.

But as MOMO Biotech co-founder Elijah Mojares puts it, existing testing processes need an upgrade to make immunotherapies more effective.

And so the startup is working on a new model that takes into account the tissue that surrounds cancers and forms a defensive ‘shield’ around the tumour.

“We're recreating the surrounding tissue in cancer. And the reason why we're recreating that is because those surrounding tissues are what stops a lot of new therapies from being effective against a lot of solid cancers,” says Mojares.

Location: London

👉 Read more about MOMO Biotech

Cambridge Future Tech

Is Cambridge Future Tech a startup? The company helps academics spin their tech out of universities and then gets really hands on with the resulting startups in their early stages.

But it’s very much at an early-stage itself, and we recently dived into its story and ambitions

“It's very difficult for the investment community to meaningfully engage in investment activities in [early-stage deep tech] because of the lack of measurable KPIs on early-stage companies,” said Cambridge Future Tech CEO and co-founder Owen Thompson, explaining the gap the company wants to fill.

Cambridge Future Tech is working towards building out eight companies per year, and since we spoke with the company, it’s raised $5 million to help it achieve its mission.

Location: Cambridge

👉 Read more about Cambridge Future Tech

Arro

User research is one of the most important parts of product development.

But it’s one that can involve hours of painstaking work, talking to people and learning about how they use a product and how it could serve them better.

With Arro, A.I. conducts conversations with users, allowing many more conversations to be had. No longer is research constrained by the number of people you can incentivise to speak to a human at a mutually convenient time. 

“You can conduct research while you're sleeping,” as co-founder and CEO Craig Watson says.

“Instead of having to set up five or 10 customer interviews, which would be standard enough, you could set it as 1,000, or 500, or 10,000 if you want to, and then that works in the background autonomously.”

Location: London

👉 Read more about Arro

PhytoMines

Unless you’ve got a mine on your doorstep or work at the sharp end of industry, you probably don’t think much about metal pollution in the soil. But mining the raw materials essential for all sorts of products can also be an environmental hazard.

Extracting metal from the ground leaves a lot of soil burdened with trace amounts of metal that can’t be mined via traditional methods, and can render land unusable for other purposes, or cause pollution that makes agriculture difficult.

That’s why clearing heavy metal pollution from soil around mines is important, through a process called remediation. But while techniques like acid leaching can remove heavy metals from soil, they have environmental impacts of their own.

PhytoMines thinks it has a solution. The London-based team wants to use plants to both clean up pollution and extract metal from the soil so that it can be used in industry. But unlike others in this space, they’re bioengineering enhanced plants specifically for the task.

Location: London

👉 Read more about PhytoMines

GambitBio

One startup that says it’s found a particularly promising route to a future where people can check themselves for signs of cancer is GambitBio.

The startup is developing a home self-test kit for early cancer detection. Following in the wake of home fertility tests, DNA tests, food sensitivity tests, and Covid tests, they want to “see a world where people aren't scared of cancer anymore,” as co-founder and CEO Tiffany Ma puts it.

The plan is to sell tests that involve users spitting into a device, which displays lines similar to a Covid test, but is designed to denote signs of specific types of cancer. The first product they intend to bring to market will be focused on prostate cancer detection. 

Location: London

👉 Read more about GambitBio

Clio

Generative A.I. has lots of potential, but its ability to help more business leaders publish books based on their own views and experiences particularly caught your imagination recently.

Clio uses A.I.–alongside founder Georgia Kirke’s experience working with business leaders to publish books–to help aspiring non-fiction authors compile their ideas in depth via a voice or text interface. It then structures them into a compelling tome, which A.I. drafts, based on the author’s input.

A human editor then polishes up the draft with the author’s input to ensure it’s fit to send to a publisher. For an additional fee, Clio will help you self-publish your book instead.

Location: Manchester

👉 Read more about Clio

Ask Silver

The internet is a minefield of scams. Your phone’s SMS inbox might well be the same. Heck, scams can even come through your letterbox.

Ask Silver is a startup with the aim of becoming a kind of firewall for scams. While pitched as a solution for the elderly, it could be useful for anyone who just wants a quick sense-check on something they’ve received and a helping hand staying safe.

The longer-term goal is to build a suite of tools to block scams across channels such as messages, emails, phone calls, or web browsing. For now though, the startup has built an MVP in the form of a WhatsApp chatbot that allows anyone to check if something they’ve received is a scam.

Location: London

👉 Read more about Ask Silver

Juno AI

Targeting SME debt finance brokers and lenders with its SaaS product, Juno AI believes it can save admin time and money, while shortening the time it takes for businesses to get their loans approved.

Using generative A.I, the software can collect information from a client via a chat interface, which co-founder Max Chmyshuk argues is superior to an application form because applicants can ask questions along the way to make sure they’re giving all the right information.

It can also handle email applications, reading them in context, extracting relevant data, finding what is missing and chasing the right people up until it has everything it needs.

Once all the information is collected, Juno AI creates a document in the right format for the lender, containing everything they need for a human to make a decision on a loan.

Location: London

👉 Read more about Juno AI

Neuwave Technologies

Conditions at sea can have a serious financial impact. Whether you operate a shipping company or are building a wind farm, knowing exactly when it’s safe to go to work is critical for not wasting time and money.

Weather is an obvious factor to consider, but the height of the waves at sea also matters a lot.

“Wave heights affect how safe it is for a vessel to go out and carry out its operations,” says Jana Stella, founder of NeuWave Technologies, a startup focused on providing more accurate predictions of wave heights than are available today.

While its tech could potentially be useful for any business operating at sea, the startup is beginning with a focus on supporting the renewable energy industry, specifically the construction and operation of offshore wind farms.

Location: Manchester

👉 Read more about Neuwave Technologies

Know a startup that should be in this list?

Email us and tell us about them! PreSeed Now covers UK-based B2B and deep tech startups that are anywhere from inception to seed stage.

We’ll have more for you this coming Thursday. See you in your inbox then!