Amid the economic malaise that followed the 2008 financial crisis in the UK – record unemployment, sluggish growth, tight fiscal consolidation – a game-changing policy drive was beginning to take shape.  This shift, driven by the Conservative-led coalition government at the time, was designed to transform the UK into “Incubator Britain” – attracting software and tech entrepreneurs with generous tax breaks, government-backed early-stage funding, and a thriving ecosystem, laying the foundations for the startup hub we recognise today. But while these initiatives succeeded in spurring startup growth, they did little to help those businesses scale. Despite having near-zero costs of…

This story continues at The Next Web

Danish startup Teton has used Gefion, one of Europe’s most powerful supercomputers, to turbocharge the development of its AI “care companion” for hospital staff.  Teton installs cameras and sensors in hospital rooms to gather real-time data. This gets fed to an AI algorithm, creating a virtual “digital twin” of the room. The model monitors patient and staff behaviour such as movement, breathing, or posture changes. If it sees a problem, the system alerts nurses via an app.  To protect privacy, all processing takes place on-device and none is sent to the cloud. No personal data or raw video footage is…

This story continues at The Next Web

Unprecedented power cuts swept across Portugal, Spain, and parts of France on Monday — instantly unravelling the tech-dependent lives of me and tens of millions of others.  At first, I wasn’t worried. Then the owner of my Lisbon apartment forwarded me a link: an article in The Sun newspaper titled “Spain & Portugal hit by huge power cuts…” I tried to open it, but the page wouldn’t load. After a few minutes of backup power, the mobile networks were dead. I walked down to my local café, hoping to get some more information. “We have no idea what’s going on…

This story continues at The Next Web

Swedish electric plane startup Heart Aerospace is relocating its headquarters from Gothenburg to Los Angeles in a move it says will “bolster product development.”  The company will lay off all of its 75 employees in Sweden, company spokesperson Christina Zander told TNW. “Recruitment in the US is ongoing,” she added.   Founded in 2018, Heart Aerospace is building a hybrid-electric 30-passenger airliner called the ES-30. The first working prototype of the plane, X1, is scheduled to take to the skies later this year.   Tobias Bengtsdahl, a partner at VC firm Antler, told TNW that Heart’s move to the US should serve…

This story continues at The Next Web

Dutch neobank Bunq today launched a crypto trading service for over 300 cryptocurrencies, including Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Solana. The service launches today and is available to Bunq users in the Netherlands, France, Spain, Ireland, Italy, and Belgium. It’s offered via Kraken, one of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges.   Bunq plans to “gradually expand” the offering to the rest of the European Economic Area (EEA), the UK, and the US.  “Our users across the world have long waited for a simple, safe, and straightforward way to invest in digital assets,” said Ali Niknam, the bank’s founder and CEO.  Niknam — who will reveal…

This story continues at The Next Web