Synthesia increases valuation to $4bn - powering the UK’s AI ambition

AI video company Synthesia, co-founded by an academic from UCL’s Department of Computer Science, has nearly doubled its valuation to $4bn (around £3.2bn) following a major funding round.

Its latest $200m Series E raise, led by Alphabet’s Google Ventures with participation from Nvidia’s venture arm and longstanding investors, lifted the company’s valuation from around $2.1bn to $4bn in just a year, cementing its position as one of the UK’s most valuable private AI companies.

From UCL research to global AI scaleup

Today, Synthesia provides AI-generated video and avatar technology worldwide, with customers spanning global and public sector organisations, including 70% of the FTSE 100. But its roots stem from university research, being co-founded by Professor Lourdes Agapito of UCL Computer Science.

This is another step in an already-impressive journey: in 2021, the company raised a $12.5m Series A round of funding, and two years later, after a Series C fundraiser of $90m, Synthesia became a ‘unicorn’, a privately held firm valued at $1bn.

The new valuation puts the company broadly on a par with Moonshot AI, which was valued at $4.8bn after a recent funding round backed by Alibaba and Tencent. This underlines the growing impact of university-born deep tech in the UK and how rapidly university originated AI businesses can now scale.

Supporting Euston’s Knowledge Quarter

The milestone comes as new analysis from UCL and Public First highlights how the life science and technology district around Euston and King’s Cross, already home to Synthesia, could add £3.5bn a year to the UK economy if it scales on a trajectory similar to Boston’s Kendall Square.