The UK is the leading location for GenAI startups in Europe, according to Accel

The UK is home to the most prolific GenAI startups in Europe and Israel, followed by Germany and Israel, according to a study by venture capital firm Accel.

Accel analyzed 221 GenAI startups and found that 30% were founded in the UK, 14% in Germany, and 13% in Israel, while 11% were based in France and 6% in the Netherlands.

GenAI is an artificial intelligence capable of generating text, images, videos, or other data based on models developed from vast amounts of information.

Britain's top universities, its track record in founding AI company Deepmind in 2010, and investments in the country by US tech giants have helped strengthen its position in AI.

However, GenAI companies founded in France led the way in fundraising with $2.29 billion, followed by the United Kingdom with $1.15 billion, according to Accel.

Paris-based Mistral, widely seen as a European rival to OpenAI, raised 600 million euros ($644 million) last week at a valuation of 5.8 billion euros.

According to Accel, GenAI startups raised more than $25 billion in funding globally in 2023, and that amount is expected to rise to about $45 billion this year.

“By taking a closer look at the roots of these companies, we see where the key talent hubs for GenAI are in the region and what common paths the founders are taking,” said Accel partner Harry Nellis.

A quarter of startups have at least one founder who has worked at Alphabet, Apple, Amazon, DeepMind, Meta or Microsoft, and more than a third hold positions at academic institutions, he said.

Accel said that a quarter of the founders were educated at British universities such as the University of Cambridge, Imperial College London, University College London, and the University of Oxford.

($1 = 0.9304 euros) (Reporting by Subantha Mukherjee in Stockholm; Editing by Mark Potter)