51乱伦

Is biotech back?

The mood across the Atlantic has shifted. In recent weeks, US biotech indices have outpaced the wider market, supported by easing interest rates, fading tariff concerns and a fresh run of deals. If the rally endures, it could direct more US capital towards promising UK start-ups that are often priced below global peers. Separately, stronger US investor sentiment could filter through to the UK, and together with rising M&A activity, leave UK companies well positioned as takeover targets. Selectivity still matters, so the firms best placed to benefit are those with resilient balance sheets, high quality datasets, credible routes to profitability and clear takeover appeal.

Macro catalysts

recently lowered interest rates for the first time this year and kept the door open to further easing. In the UK, the Bank of England looks set to stay on hold into year end, with the next cut most likely around February 2026, subject to the labour market and the inflationary effects of fiscal choices.

Sector sparks

Clinical readouts, approvals and deal announcements have improved tone, but the more telling signal is M&A. Novo Nordisk moving on Akero Therapeutics, Pfizer on Metsera, and Genmab announcing an acquisition of Merus are not tourist trades. Big pharma sits on more than $1 trillion of cash and faces patent cliffs. The result is renewed appetite for pipeline, platform and options-to-buy. In theory the UK is well positioned with companies that are outperforming global counterparts in scientific discovery while operating at lower valuations. Those that are aligned with the pipelines of big pharma will be in focus.

Recent Deals:

• Bristol Myers Squibb agreed to pay $1.5bn to acquire Orbital Therapeutics.
• Novo Nordisk agreed to acquire Akero Therapeutics for $4.7bn upfront.
• Novo Nordisk will pay up to $2.1bn to license Omeros Corporation鈥檚 experimental MASP-3 inhibitor for rare blood and kidney disorders.
• Pfizer paying $4.9bn for Metsera, with additional payments possible.
• Genmab announced an $8bn acquisition of Merus.
• Johnson & Johnson is in discussions to acquire Protagonist Therapeutics.
• Merck completed its acquisition of Verona Pharma for around $10bn.

Policy clarity, discipline and AI

A partial resolution of US pricing noise and specific company agreements on direct-to-consumer programmes have removed some overhang. Further to Pfizer announcing a deal with the US administration agreed to participate in TrumpRx.gov, the direct purchasing platform of the US administration. Meanwhile, the US Department of Commerce granted a three-year delay to the implementation of new tariffs to AstraZeneca. The latter said this will allow it to onshore all its medicines manufacturing for the US, its largest market by sales. Other details of the agreement remain confidential.  Paired with AI鈥檚 increasingly credible role in compressing R&D timelines and raising hit rates, the medium-term case strengthens. Restructuring has continued, with more than 60 layoff rounds in Q3 and over 23,000 announced or projected cuts across biopharma. This has included Novo Nordisk (9,000 jobs to go), CSL (4,350 jobs to go) and Merck & Co or MSD (6,000 jobs to go). This is not inconsistent with future growth. It is discipline and recalibration.

Investment stance 鈥� cautious optimism with explicit bias to quality

Street commentary has turned more constructive. Morgan Stanley talks about favourable M&A micro conditions. Bernstein points to three reasons to be optimistic. JPMorgan highlights obesity and metabolic disease as magnets for capital. Goldman emphasises stock-picking in obesity, cardiology and next-gen oncology, while recognising that healthcare overall has lagged. The thread that ties these together is selectivity.

Select Investor Sentiment (summary of analyst coverage over the past two months)

Six signals

It is not only the US showing momentum. This week brought six encouraging signals from the UK which, while not glossing over ongoing challenges, collectively point to the resilience and strength of the UK鈥檚 science and innovation economy

 1. Indian corporate investment lands in the UK

companies committed more than £1 billion to the UK, with the potential to create 6,900 jobs, much of it in engineering and tech, and importantly not confined to London. Combined with more than £250 billion of wider investment secured since June, this tells a coherent story.

Top five investments by value

2. Venture momentum

raised $9 billion in Q3 2025, the second strongest Q3 on record and the best quarter since 2022. Year-to-date the UK has raised more VC investment than France, Germany and Switzerland combined, the next three European countries.  Set alongside a wave of corporate commitments into the UK, the country has a credible tech growth story to tell. Furthermore, the latest statistics show that more capital is landing outside of London promoting regional growth.

By the numbers

• Regional depth. 45% of 2025 rounds were completed outside London, with Cambridge, Glasgow and Manchester leading activity beyond the capital.
• Mega rounds. 12 mega rounds of $100 million or more in Q3, nearly matching the previous two quarters combined (14), and accounting for 61% of all UK VC raised in the quarter.
• Billion plus. Revolut and Nscale each closed $1 billion plus rounds in Q3. Other notable raises included CityFibre, Quantinuum, Nothing and Signal AI.
• Series A pulse. 46 Series A rounds in Q3, the highest in seven quarters. The largest A-round went to CuspAI, which applies AI to design new materials for sustainability and clean energy. Other A-round recipients included Triver, Alchemab Therapeutics and Zilo.
• Frontier momentum. UK quantum computing start-ups have already set a record year in 2025, accelerating from a low base.

3.  Oxford鈥檚 step-change in private R&D

Larry Ellison is investing a further £890 million into the EIT in Oxford. The new investment will expand the EIT campus to over 2 million sq ft, making it one of Europe鈥檚 largest private R&D campuses.  The institute, founded in 2023, targets four pillars: health and generative biology, food security and sustainable agriculture, climate and atmospheric CO鈧� management, and AI and robotics. It is already backing UK companies such as  , an Oxford University spinout. In Cambridge joined up with the EIT to find new medicines. The EIT will gain access to the companies鈥� genome writing platform.  These investments further cement Oxford鈥檚 position as a leading global innovation hub, with EIT鈥檚 commitment set to finance a new wave of high-potential start-ups and spin-outs.

.4.  Autonomous vehicles: the UK moves up the European ranking

While the UK has trailed others in autonomous vehicle trials, recent moves are pushing it toward the front of the pack in Europe at least. Alphabet-owned plans to launch robotaxis in London next year, its first European city. It currently operates more than 250,000 paid rides per week across five US cities as well as a pilot in Tokyo. London mapping and testing will start across a 100-square-mile area with human safety drivers in Jaguar I-PACE EVs. Waymo will partner with Moove for fleet operations and charging depots. London and Oxford already host Waymo engineering teams focused on large-scale closed-loop simulation. 

Also this week it was reported that UK company is in talks with Microsoft and SoftBank to raise up to $2 billion of new funding. The deal could value Wayve at $8 billion. Wayve occupies the brainy middle of the AV stack, focused on building the technology behind the self-driving cars. It has forged a partnership with Uber to to trial fully autonomous vehicles in London next year.  

The UK鈥檚 CCAV estimates that by 2035, about four in ten new cars could drive themselves, creating a sector worth about £42 billion a year and 38,000 jobs.  New AI learning models, regulatory reform, large-scale investment, successful trials, and a reduction in the cost of technology required has all helped to accelerate the sector forward. However, there are still significant challenges. Not least the basic economics. HSBC calculates that robotaxis won鈥檛 be break-even on a cash flow basis util 7 to 8 years after launch. They also cite concerns that the absence of a driver isn鈥檛 going to materially change consumer spend on transport. Waymo sits in a division that lost $5.6 billion last year. Forecasts outside of the CCAV vary on when AVs may reach mass adoption. Morgan Stanley analysts expect one in four cars to feature some self-driving capabilities by 2030 while Uber鈥檚 CEO, Dara Khosrowshahi, recently predicted that robotaxis will significantly displace human drivers in about 10 to 15 years, calling it a 鈥渂ig societal challenge鈥� as the gig-economy workforce eventually transitions.

5.  The spin-out pipeline is alive

Parkwalk and Beauhurst show spin-out investment rising to £3.35 billion in 2024, more than 40% higher year on year, with first-time deals up 68%. H1 2025 added £790 million, including significant raises for CellCentric and Draig Therapeutics. Life sciences remain the powerhouse. The Golden Triangle continues to dominate, however new partnerships and funds are helping strengthen ecosystems in the North with Manchester-based spinouts securing a record £56 million in 2024, and universities in Edinburgh, Sheffield and Leeds becoming increasingly active. Spin-outs are the lifeblood of the innovation economy so it is promising to see an increase in investment.

6.  Cambridge鈥檚 knowledge economy continues to compound

A report from d and the CBR finds that there are now over 150 clusters within a 20-mile radius of Cambridge, with over 100,000 employees in over 4,000 companies in these locations. The number of knowledge intensive companies in these clusters rose by 30% and the number of employees in knowledge intensive companies in these locations rose by 76% between 2015-16 and 2023-24. Furthermore, the Greater Cambridge Region has far outpaced the national economy, with knowledge intensive employment making the difference.  This underscores the role that the knowledge economy has in driving economic growth within a location.

Other news that caught my eye this week

announces a £50 million boost for mental health research.

French AI company is applying its technology and skills to science.  The French AI company is launching a new division dedicated to applying AI to scientific discovery. 51乱伦鈥檚 analysis of AI companies funded this year shows that, among those with a declared vertical, healthcare and life sciences is the leading sector focus. Just as the tech giants expanded into healthcare and life sciences, the new wave of AI firms is likely to follow the same path.

Jack & Jill has raised £15 million in seed investment to build and expand in Europe and the United States. Jack & Jill is already scaling rapidly in London.

London-based engineering development platform raised $23 million in a Series A round. Flow Engineering, founded in 2016, operates an engineering development platform aimed at reinventing the engineering design framework. The company has 18 employees and focuses on automating manual execution work to accelerate hardware invention and streamline the engineering process.

After closing a $235 million series A last month, Lila has now  with an additional $115 million, including funds from the venture arm of AI titan Nvidia. The firm is establishing new "AI science factories" in Boston, London, and San Francisco.

on AstraZeneca鈥檚 transparent pipeline ethos in Cambridge and why putting science on show matters.

is developing a five-year plan to cover more than $1 trillion in pledged spending through new revenue sources, debt partnerships, and additional fundraising rounds. OpenAI has 700 million active users but only 5% pay for subscriptions. The company wants to double that percentage to 10%. OpenAI lost $8 billion in operations during the first half of 2025. This happened even though revenue more than doubled from the previous year.

have repaired a natural gateway into the brains of mice, allowing the clumps and tangles associated with  disease to be swept away. After just three drug injections, mice with certain genes that mimic Alzheimer's showed a reversal of several key pathological features.

UK services output grew by 0.4% in the three months to August 2025, compared with the three months to May 2025.  There was a rise in output in 10 of the 14 subsectors in the three months to August 2025, with professional, scientific and technical activities being in the top three largest positive contributors up 0.6%, because of architectural and engineering activities; technical testing and analysis (up 3.9%).

Goldman Sachs unveiled its 鈥淥neGS 3.0鈥� strategy, placing AI at the heart of client onboarding, lending processes, regulatory reporting and vendor management. The programme is a multiyear effort, yet headcount is still expected to rise year on year.  It underscores how traditional sectors are also investing in AI. This was further evidenced in the latest on the accounting and consulting sector.

Finally, I thought it would be useful to begin spotlighting exemplar science and innovation spaces, focusing on building specifications and design. With Databricks in the news this week for launching a plan to train 100,000 workers across the UK and Ireland, in partnership with 40 universities including LSE, UCL, Newcastle, Edinburgh and Oxford, I have started with a look at their London office.

In October 2024 Databricks announced a new regional hub in London, one of the company鈥檚 largest offices outside of its San Francisco headquarters.  Set across seven floors the 30,000 sq ft space in Fitzrovia features a range of working areas and customer facing spaces. Key features include:

• Barista and café on the ground floor.
• Meeting rooms with a range of seating options from more formal desks to sofas. All with digital infrastructure embedded.
• The top floor has an events space and customer suite that includes a bar and terrace.
• Each floor has a different colour palette for easier wayfinding. The working areas have a mix of working spaces from collaborative areas to quiet rooms.
• Rest and express rooms are included to support inclusivity and wellbeing.
• There is a dedicated Tech Hub so tech issues can be resolved easily on-site.
• Dedicated training space.
• Flexibility is built in so the space can be used in different ways. They often have pop up events for staff, for example.
• There is even a Databricks merchandise store. A way to connect with customers.