If you have a startup that is taking a proven idea and exploiting a niche ("twitter for left handers", "ebay for counterfeit goods", "airbnb for dyslexic vegetarians") or you're taking an existing business model and disrupting it via the internet (car rental, clothes swaps, food delivery) then you may well find seed money in the UK.
But if it's a new idea (new product/service) then in my experience even with a team with a proven track record, and a product built up and running to proof-of-engineering-principle, there aren't many people who can look at an idea and a first version and see beyond the fact that it's new, different and raw to see the opportunity to invest.
It would seem the early stage money is not tech-savvy, not excited by tech, and is looking for iteration over innovation. That is, it's risk averse and favours the reliability of a decent chance of incremental gains rather than lower chance of much bigger gains.
I haven't met everyone, by a long stretch, and it may well be that my product/pitch is wrong, but genuine innovation doesn't seem to come through the UK seed/VC channels, while such products start in the UK they generally find seed money from the US.
But if it's a new idea (new product/service) then in my experience even with a team with a proven track record, and a product built up and running to proof-of-engineering-principle, there aren't many people who can look at an idea and a first version and see beyond the fact that it's new, different and raw to see the opportunity to invest.
It would seem the early stage money is not tech-savvy, not excited by tech, and is looking for iteration over innovation. That is, it's risk averse and favours the reliability of a decent chance of incremental gains rather than lower chance of much bigger gains.
I haven't met everyone, by a long stretch, and it may well be that my product/pitch is wrong, but genuine innovation doesn't seem to come through the UK seed/VC channels, while such products start in the UK they generally find seed money from the US.