Tech Nation Rising Stars Midlands Final 2025 – Notes from the Canopy

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There’s a quiet satisfaction in sitting on the edge of things, absorbing detail, thinking clearly, watching structure unfold. Last April, at The Canopy at The Bond in Birmingham’s Digbeth district, I was glad to attend the Midlands Regional Final of Tech Nation Rising Stars 2025. This wasn’t just a pitch competition; it was a sharp snapshot of the region’s entrepreneurial promise, delivered without bluster but full of energy.

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Table of Contents

Introduction

I attended the event not just to observe, but to pick up hints and tips, see what others were pitching, and understand how founders are framing their ideas under pressure. It was also a chance to network and stay tuned in to what’s emerging across the Midlands. I was joined by my cofounder at Psyber Inc, Sevgi Aksoy, and together we reflected on where our own work in cyber psychology fits into the wider innovation landscape.

The event was advertised online, and I saw it on LinkedIn. More details on the dedicated page at the TechNation Rising Stars site.

The Setting

The venue, industrial meets canal-side calm, set the tone. The Canopy is a clean, open space with honest brick and big glass, a good match for what the Midlands does best: honest innovation with ambition.

Tech Nation’s Rising Stars is a respected stage. This isn’t your average showcase, it’s a pipeline to national and international exposure. Today’s event was one of several regional finals across the UK, all building toward the national Grand Final during London Tech Week.

Two categories:

  • Emerging Stars – contenders for the £335,000 Haatch Regional Prize Fund
  • One-to-Win – finalists vying for a Grand Final spot and a shot at £1 million in investment

The “Emerging Stars” competition was “won” by Impact Advantage, and I’m glad I wasn’t judging the competition because there were great entries across the board.

Structure, Substance, and Judging

Each founder had a focused opportunity to pitch, standing before a panel of experienced judges and a room of peers, investors, and curious observers like myself. Judges included:

The emphasis was on clarity, traction, and problem-solution alignment. No overblown claims. Just hard questions and founders trying to hold their line.

Emerging Stars

Neuro Notion – ADHD Productivity Platform

Josh’s Neuro Notion platform is designed specifically for people with ADHD who struggle to stay organised and maintain consistent routines. Unlike mindfulness apps such as Zensory, Neuro Notion focuses on building structured habits and reinforcing executive function skills. While the neurodivergent market is often treated as a monolith, this product leans into the specificity of ADHD as an experience distinct from other conditions. The pitch was clear about the need for tools grounded in lived experience rather than generic productivity frameworks. There’s strong potential for Neuro Notion to carve out a niche as a practical, evidence-based companion for neurodivergent professionals, especially if the team continues to focus on clarity and measurable outcomes.

GenesisAI – Deep Tech with Commercial Clarity

Genassis came across as one of the most mature and commercially ready businesses in the Emerging Stars cohort. With a pre-money valuation of £6 million, the founder laid out a clear roadmap to scale their platform beyond pilot contracts. Their revenue metrics stood out: £3.5 million in monthly recurring revenue, 656 active clients, and a 131% compound annual growth rate. The financial forecast included ambitious targets, growing from £1.1 million in revenue by FY26 to £32 million by FY29, with EBITDA swinging from negative to £15 million profit. The pitch also included an offer; early investors committing the first £750,000 would receive discounted participation in the next round. Overall, Genassis felt like a business ready to graduate from startup to scale-up, combining impressive traction with a credible path to profitability.

Matresa – Women’s Health Innovation

Matresa’s presentation was both personal and commercially disciplined. The team focused on “matrescence,” the major life transition into motherhood, which remains an underserved area in digital health. Their pitch combined a clear articulation of the problem with well-structured traction metrics: 2,400 B2B users, 10% stickiness, a customer acquisition cost of £23, and a lifetime value of £159. They also reported an NPS of 65, which suggests high satisfaction among early adopters. The company is seeking £350,000 to expand its platform further and has support from partners including EY, Warwick, and Innovate UK Edge. Notably, their advisory board includes Professor Sana Khareghani, who was formerly Head of AI for the UK Government. Matresa left the impression of a team combining empathy, purpose, and rigour, a combination still too rare in women’s health innovation.

RideCommerce – Ethical Supply Chains

RideCommerce pitched a platform that sits at the intersection of logistics and sustainability. The idea is to help businesses track and improve the ethical and environmental impact of their procurement processes. While the vision for transparent, values-led supply chains is strong and timely, the pitch was lighter on technical depth and detail about the underlying IP and platform architecture. This will likely be an area the team needs to strengthen to convince enterprise customers and investors alike. Still, the clarity of the purpose, enabling companies to make supply chain decisions that align with their sustainability commitments, felt compelling.

Impact Advantage – ESG Quantified

Impact Advantage offers a dashboard solution for companies trying to measure and communicate their ESG performance more credibly. The founder’s message was direct: too many businesses self-report progress without evidence, and stakeholders increasingly expect transparency. Their product is designed to align with emerging standards such as CSRD and ISSB. During the pitch, the founder described the approach as “impact-led, not impact-flavoured.” While the timing and regulatory tailwinds are promising, this is a crowded field. The question will be how Impact Advantage can differentiate, especially against large incumbents and well-funded platforms.

Swai.ai – Sell With AI (Governance + GTM)

Merhed’s Swai.ai is a platform for AI-driven sales enablement, with a deliberate emphasis on governance and compliance. The pitch underscored the risk of brand safety failures and regulatory problems as companies adopt GenAI tools without controls. Swai.ai already has 156 paid subscribers and forecasts £52,000 in monthly recurring revenue, with a £400,000 raise in progress (backed by SEIS Advance Assurance). The business model mixes subscriptions, ad spend commissions, and in-app upgrades. The timeline was also clear: the model training began in December 2023, and the MVP launched in March 2025. Advisors include Vernon Hogg from Founders Collective and former senior product leaders from Currys. With supporters like Microsoft Accelerator and NatWest, the company seems well-positioned to carve out a compliance-first niche.

Econominds.AI – Adaptive Learning for Skills Bootcamps

Econominds.AI pitched itself with the tagline “Study less, achieve more”, The founder laid out a clear problem: traditional training is expensive and often wasted, with £8,000 in costs per learner and £10.5 million in lost productivity per 1,000 employees. The company aims to deliver adaptive learning to improve engagement and retention, particularly among 16–24-year-olds, 13.4% of whom are not in education or employment. Supported by UKRI, Innovate UK, BBC, Lloyds, and TechWM, Econominds.AI has positioned itself as a credible player in learning technology. It will be interesting to see how the company pivots this proposition into larger enterprise contracts.

SendMercury – SME Market Access Platform

SendMercury’s pitch was about levelling the playing field for smaller brands that lack the resources to compete with giants like Amazon (whose 2024 advertising spend alone was £21 billion). The platform helps SMEs launch products, run smart testing campaigns, and find the right buyers across international markets. The team includes Oje and Ized Uanikhehi (CEO and CMO) and Brian Omoruyi as Head of Engineering. Backers include CNN Africa, Devtraco, and Ankle. The presentation was confident, with a clear articulation of the marketing power gap that holds back smaller firms. The next step will be proving traction in the UK market to complement their existing partnerships.

One to Win

SYMBIOTEX – Sustainable Plastics for Medical Use

Olivia Simpson, SYMBIOTEX’s CEO, gave a standout presentation addressing a deceptively simple question: “Why should medical devices that help our health be detrimental to both the environment and us?” The problem is clear: more than 60 million inhalers are used annually in the UK, yet fewer than 1% are recycled. SYMBIOTEX has developed biodegradable alternatives for lateral flow tests and inhalers, with a production roadmap that scales from 500,000 units in year one to 10 million units by year three, backed by a forecast of £13 million in revenue. Their advisory board includes Dr Richard Hibson, Simon Stewart-Smith, Mattia Parati, and Andrew Barrass. The company has already built partnerships with Mitsui & Co., Aquapak, the University of Birmingham, and Verizon. This was easily one of the most polished and investable propositions of the day.

Cude AI – Data Protection & IP Safeguarding

Cude AI’s focus is on reducing IP theft and code leakage, helping companies protect sensitive assets across development workflows. While the pitch was more technical and less showy, the relevance was clear: as more companies build proprietary models and software, protecting that intellectual property becomes critical. The idea of integrating legal and technical safeguards directly into developer tools could be a strong differentiator if the execution is robust. Cude AI felt like one of the teams most ready to serve enterprise clients who understand the rising stakes of code security.

Side Conversations: Cyber, Strategy & the West Midlands

It wasn’t just the pitches that made the day great; it was the people. I had the chance to reconnect with:

  • Huw from Midven, always insightful on investment and early-stage finance.
  • Tom from B13.ai, doing excellent work at the intersection of data and applied AI, admitted that AI fatigue was something he was seeing more of.

Plus, I had time to speak with Naomi from TechWM, catching up on Birmingham’s growing cyber ecosystem. We spoke about:

  • The upcoming Cyber strand during Birmingham Tech Week
  • Potential Cyber Local investments and DSIT strategy alignment
  • Strengthening local capacity in cybersecurity through new convening mechanisms (CWG, IAWM, WMCA, etc.)

You can find more info on the programme and regional events here:

Final Thoughts

Events like this aren’t just about winners. They’re about signal through noise. The ability to pitch under pressure, to articulate complex problems simply, and to show that you’re building something that matters. I’ll be watching the Grand Final closely.

I find events like this can be overwhelming in parts, the social choreography, the micro-clusters of conversation, the assumptions of fluency in startup theatre. But what cuts through is clarity. Intent. Well-structured ideas. And founders who genuinely want to solve something, not just win applause.

Tech Nation’s Rising Stars isn’t just about who’s loudest or slickest. It’s about trajectory, potential, and how founders handle scrutiny when it’s quiet. The Midlands showed up today with companies solving real problems in neurodiversity, environment, health, logistics, and governance.