A big week for European chips and a new Robotics unicorn
Seb Johnson
August 24, 2026 • Estimated Reading Time: 4 minutes
🌟 QUICK INTRO
Hello and welcome back.
UK chip startup Fractile is reportedly in talks at a $6.5bn valuation, Swiss robotics company Gravis Robotics became a European unicorn with a $200m SoftBank-led round, and London AI systems company Callosum closed a $100m Seed with Atomico and the UK Sovereign AI Fund.
Read on.
I'll be in Copenhagen this week for TechBBQ, so if you see me say HEY.
💰 BIG ROUNDS
Zurich-based Gravis Robotics raised $200m led by SoftBank to expand its autonomous technology for heavy machinery. Europe's newest robotics unicorn. Read more here.
French Ingenico secured €150m in fresh capital to expand its payments platform. Read more here.
London-based Callosum raised a $100m Seed led by Atomico with the UK Sovereign AI Fund, Plural and DCVC to build systems software that matches AI tasks to the cheapest suitable models and chips. Read more here.
Munich-based Oceanloop secured up to €38.5m to scale its land-based aquaculture technology. Read more here.
Vienna-based Enpulsion raised €22.5m and simultaneously acquired British space propulsion company Lift Me Off. Read more here.
Stuttgart-based Flip secured €22m to scale its AI platform for frontline workers. Read more here.
London-based Prevalent AI secured $22m in growth investment to scale its enterprise AI platform. Read more here.
Stockholm-based Pixelgen Technologies raised €13.26m to advance spatial mapping of cell-surface proteins. Read more here.
Limerick-based Redfaire raised €13m from BGF to power global growth and scale its ERP and cloud services business. Read more here.
Linköping-based SweGaN raised €12.1m Series B to scale gallium nitride on silicon carbide epitaxial wafer production. Read more here.
💰 SLIGHTLY SMALLER ROUNDS
Plymouth-based Oshen raised $5m led by Lunar Ventures to upgrade manufacturing for its autonomous sail-powered marine vessels. Cool defence-adjacent hardware play.
Danish Aisel raised €1.7m to tackle psychiatry's capacity crisis with AI. Read more here.
Edinburgh-based Singular Photonics raised £1.6m led by ACF Investors to develop its fabless semiconductor technology.
🎙️ Podcast of the Week - Danyal Akarca - Cofounder of Callosum on their $100m Seed
Callosum just raised $100m led by Atomico, Plural and DCVC. It's one of the largest seed-stage rounds in UK history, coming just five months after Callosum came out of stealth.
Callosum builds software that lets AI run across many different types of chips at the same time, making it faster, cheaper and more capable.
We chatted about the round, the amazing success they've seen to date and why London is becoming a Deep Tech hub.
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📰 BIG NEWS
Fractile
The UK AI inference chip startup is in advanced talks to raise around $600m at a $6.5bn pre-money valuation, co-led by Lightspeed Venture Partners and Redpoint Ventures.
The round has come after signing a $250m deal with Anthropic. The chips are not expected to be commercially available until 2027.
Fractile only closed a $220m Series B in May at a $1bn valuation, making this one of the most aggressive valuation jumps of the year.
Read more here.
Domyn
Milan-based Domyn, the LLM and AI gigafactory company led by Uljan Sharka, is reportedly raising a further $2bn per Sifted. The company has already raised over $1bn to date, split roughly 10% equity, 90% debt.
Domyn was recently selected by the European Commission to lead the EUROPA consortium, building an open-source frontier model with 400bn+ parameters covering all 24 EU languages. Its first Italian gigafactory is set to go live in early 2026 with 6,000 Nvidia Blackwell chips. Sharka says the company is "a few quarters away from $1bn ARR."
There has been a lot of scepticism on social media about the ARR claims and the company's low profile relative to the numbers involved.
Read more here.
📰 SMALLER NEWS
Gary Hoffman is stepping down as Monzo chairman after nearly eight years, ahead of the bank's expected IPO. Read more here.
Global humanoid robot shipments jumped ~300% year-on-year in H1 2026, with 22,000+ units distributed globally per Counterpoint Research.
Nebius is looking to raise $4.5bn through a bond issue to fund its AI infrastructure expansion. Read more here.
The Startup Coalition warned that UK startups are losing faith in government tech promises, citing years of unfulfilled commitments and persistent procurement barriers despite the "Buy British" campaign.
💰 M&A
Oakley Capital took a majority stake in Sofia-based Graphwise, marking one of Bulgaria's largest software exits. Read more here.
Munich-based Tiven is acquiring German battery storage manufacturer Sonnen. Read more here.
German software unicorn Dash0 acquired Berlin-based Polar Signals to expand its observability platform. Read more here.
Portsmouth-based SubSea Craft made a multi-million-euro investment in UK battery specialist LORILLION, acquiring a 40% stake. Read more here.
Swiss digital health startup Aepsy acquired Kinastic to expand its offering. Read more here.
💶 FUND NEWS
Revolut founder Nik Storonsky's QuantumLight closed its second venture fund at $500m (€432m) to back AI and crypto startups, using its AI-driven investment strategy. Read more here.
UK-based defence tech investor and builder Gallos raised $50m to expand its portfolio. Read more here.
A UK venture studio led by ex-GCHQ and NSA leaders raised £35m to build cybersecurity and national-security-adjacent startups. Read more here.
🎪 EVENTS
Parloa has announced WAVE 2026: The AI + CX conference: October 7-8, 700+ enterprise AI and CX leaders in Berlin for hands-on workshops, a look at real-world AI roadmaps, and a peek into what's coming next. 30+ speakers, including leaders from HealthEquity, AUTO1, Langdock, and SAP, as well as world champion Bastian Schweinsteiger. Register now with code W26-ScalingEu-50 for 50% off here.
Tickets are available for Wave, the leading tech conference in Turin. Confirmed speakers include Dario Amodei, Jony Ive, Charlie Songhurst, and many more. Get 10% off using discount code SCALINGEUROPE-WAVE10 at checkout here.
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Thank you.
Seb