Optima secures fresh investment from GCP to boost UK & EU AI growth

Optima Partners, an Edinburgh-based AI and data consultancy, has received new investment from Growth Capital Partners (GCP) as it seeks to scale its UK and European operations. The consultancy, founded in 2013, specialises in AI-based business transformation across sectors such as financial services, insurance, energy, telecoms, and life sciences.

Expansion plans

The GCP funding will support Optima's strategic growth initiatives. The company said this includes further development in customer service, product and service portfolio, marketing efforts, and internal talent development. The additional capital aims to help Optima strengthen its market position both within the UK and across Europe.

Optima collaborates with enterprise clients to tackle challenges using business strategy, machine learning, AI, and advanced engineering. Its approach centres on three interconnected objectives: maximising customer value through personalisation, improving operations with AI-enabled decision-making, and building robust data foundations for growth. Optima's bioXcelerate AI division underpins its work in the healthcare and life sciences fields.

Leadership and growth

The company's expansion has accelerated since 2021 following the partnership between founder Alan Crawley and Dr Chris Foley, whose background in advanced mathematics supports the firm's AI capabilities. In 2022, Optima also secured investment from BGF. Together, the leadership team and its investors have broadened the consultancy's reach and service offering, particularly amongst large corporate clients.

Alan Crawley, Founder, Optima Partners, said: "Since its launch, Optima has gone from strength to strength, expanding our capabilities, growing our team and deepening our impact across a range of critical sectors. The launch of our health data science division, bioXcelerate AI, has been a major milestone, reflecting the scale of opportunity we see as organisations look to make better use of data and advanced analytics. The backing and continued support from BGF has been instrumental in helping us reach this stage of our growth."

"This investment from GCP marks the start of an exciting new chapter. It gives us the momentum to build on our success, accelerate our plans and continue developing the capabilities that will define the next stage of Optima's journey."

Investment rationale

GCP focuses on knowledge-based businesses and sees Optima's combination of technical expertise and business strategy as an asset. Optima's client roster includes major organisations seeking to apply data and AI to achieve measurable business outcomes.

Chris Foley, CEO, said: "Our focus is firmly on enabling the next phase of Optima's growth. GCP's investment is a strong endorsement of our mission to help our clients turn their data, analytics and AI strategies into measurable outcomes at speed. This funding allows us to accelerate our growing track record of innovation, invest further in our people, and strengthen the infrastructure required to support our clients at a greater scale."

"With this partnership, we can move faster to help organisations understand, adapt and enhance human- and data-led decision-making supported by AI, bridging academic foundations with industry-focused and value-based impact."

Richard Shaw, Partner at GCP, said: "Alan, Chris and the wider Optima team have built a highly differentiated business at the intersection of advanced data science, machine learning and enterprise transformation. As organisations increasingly seek to harness their data and accelerate AI adoption, Optima is uniquely positioned to help them tackle mission-critical challenges and unlock meaningful commercial outcomes."

"The business has already demonstrated impressive momentum and scale, supported by strong leadership, deep technical skill sets and robust industry expertise. We are delighted to partner with the team at this exciting stage of their journey and are looking forward to working together to enhance go-to-market capability, strengthen organisational infrastructure and scale delivery capacity in a rapidly growing and strategically important sector."

Richard Pugh, Investor at BGF, said: "Since our initial investment in 2022, Optima has seen exceptional growth and development, both in terms of its team and its abilities to revolutionise organisations' use of data and advanced analytics."

"This is a fantastic result for both BGF and the Optima team. Our backing has supported Alan's ambitious vision and combined with Chris' expertise and direction, the business is in an ideal position to gather pace and seize the huge opportunities arising in AI and data."

"It has been a pleasure working with Alan and Chris over the years and we look forward to continuing our backing as a minority shareholder, supporting the business as it embarks on this next phase of growth alongside GCP," said Pugh.