London financial startup raises £585k in seed funding for expansion

A London financial startup has announced that it has raised £585k in seed funding as it aims to expand its customer base.

ETIQ, which helps financial companies identify and eliminate bias within their algorithms, has raised £585k in pre-seed funding, including equity investment from SFC Capital and grants from Innovate UK.

The funding will be used for research and development to improve the platform as well as to expand the company’s marketing and sales functions.

Iris Anson, co-founder of ETIQ, commented: “Machine learning is more and more integral to products and services we use every day - and to decisions that businesses and governments make about us - but without a widely-accessible way of identifying and eliminating bias, it could cause significant damage to our society by further entrenching discriminatory decision-making despite our best intentions and without us even realising.

“We are delighted to have secured this investment. It will allow us to accelerate the development of our product and hire some key staff to help our expansion as we aim to tackle this enormous challenge for society.”

Rohallah Ghasemi, investment executive at SFC Capital, said: “The ETIQ team really impressed us with their idea.

“Machine learning is becoming more and more crucial across all industries, and we need the right tools to ensure that it is developed and deployed correctly.

“ETIQ has already gained good traction in the market, and we look forward to seeing how they develop.”