Britain is selling its best startups too early, warns angel investor with 14 exits
One of the UK’s most experienced angel investors has warned that Britain is selling its most promising technology companies before they reach scale, leaving overseas acquirers and investors to capture the value built here.
Simon Thorpe, founder of Delta2020 and former chair of Cambridge Angels, has backed more than 60 UK startups over 15 years and recorded 14 exits, including SwiftKey to Microsoft and Spectral Edge to Apple. Only one of those exits was to a UK buyer.
Speaking on the latest episode of SyndicateRoom’s Angel Insights podcast, Simon said: “Sadly, yes, we are selling our companies too early. We are good at startups in the UK. We’re not so good at scale-ups.”
Value built in Britain, captured elsewhere
Thorpe says overseas buyers see UK companies as good value for their people, technology and intellectual property, often more than for their revenue. On Apple’s 2019 acquisition of Spectral Edge, a UK image-processing company he backed: “They wanted the technology and the people.”
The same pattern shows up in growth funding. Quantexa, the London data analytics company and one of AlbionVC’s largest holdings, raised a $175m Series F in 2025 led by the venture arm of Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan.
“Why isn’t it a UK pension fund that’s investing in that company?”
Thorpe welcomes the Mansion House pension reforms but warns the timetable is long, and that UK pension funds do not yet have the expertise to back growth companies after a generation of investing for income.
The case for “replacement capital”
Until institutional money arrives, Thorpe argues the UK needs more sources of capital that can buy out early investors and fund the next stage, so a trade sale is not the only route to liquidity. He points to four:
Venture capital trusts. VCT income tax relief fell from 30% to 20% in April 2026, a change he says “rather came out of the blue”, although the same Budget doubled the amount companies can raise under EIS and VCT.
Secondaries. Dedicated secondary funds and the new PISCES framework for trading private-company shares. Letting founders sell enough to “at least pay off their mortgage”, he says, can help them keep building rather than sell early.
Venture debt. Thorpe chairs a venture debt investment committee at Salica Investments (formerly Hambro Perks).
IP-backed loans. Lenders including NatWest now use valuations from Inngot, one of his portfolio companies, to lend against intellectual property. Thorpe estimates a company might borrow 40 to 50% of its IP’s value.
Sovereignty and ambition
On AI and semiconductors, Thorpe contrasts the UK’s 2023 commitment of £1bn over a decade with the roughly $52bn set aside by the US CHIPS Act. The right figure for the UK is “certainly more than a billion. And we are not ambitious enough,” he says, arguing that Britain should work with major European economies and focus on areas of genuine strength.
He sees angels as the scouts of the system: “seeking out these great little nuggets of great people and great tech, and helping them get on the ladder… and pass the baton on to institutional funding.”
Tom Britton, co-founder of SyndicateRoom and host of Angel Insights, said: “Simon’s record makes the point better than any statistic: when British companies sell, they mostly sell abroad. Exits are good news for founders and investors. What the UK needs is enough capital in the room that founders get a real choice about when to sell.”