SoftBank leads $300m funding round into British AI patent firm
UK-based PatSnap has seen a boom in interest from businesses in China in recent years
16 March 2021 • 10:00pm
SoftBank and Tencent have led a $300m (£215m) funding round into a London-headquartered business that uses artificial intelligence (AI) to run a global R&D database.
PatSnap, which was founded in 2007 and is based out of the UK and Singapore, uses AI and machine learning to give customers information on patents and other intellectual property filings.
The company has attracted funding from SoftBank’s $108bn second Vision Fund, the successor to its first $100bn fund that backed businesses including WeWork and Slack.
Imagination Technologies loses chief of staff after Chinese ownership row
It comes just weeks after the Telegraph revealed the company s former CEO was suing Imagination
Credit: HANNAH MCKAY/Reuters
Imagination Technologies has lost a fourth executive in less than a year, amid an overhaul of the British chip designer s leadership team in the wake of a bitter boardroom row.
Woz Ahmed has stepped down from his role as Imagination s chief strategy officer and chief of staff, saying in a post on LinkedIn that he had decided that now is a good time to leave .
His departure comes amid a slew of executive changes at the company, starting last April when boss Ron Black left the company in the wake of claims its Beijing backers were plotting to appoint representatives to its board.