I could have some fun here with the usual clichés. Ee bah gum lad, it is Yorkshire AI. Or perhaps AI with nowt tekken out. But as a Welshman, I recognise that I am skating on the thinnest of thin ice with that sort of lazy stereotyping.
By now you are probably wondering, quite reasonably, what on earth I am talking about.
So, here goes. Serial entrepreneur David Richards is ushering his latest venture onto the markets by a slightly roundabout route and it will trade under the proudly regional banner of Yorkshire AI.
For the uninitiated, Richards co-founded WANdisco (now Cirata), runs the AI-focused venture outfit Yorkshire AI Labs (YAIL), and also chairs the Aquis-listed minnow Lift Global Ventures.
Lift, for its part, was created by Zak Mir, small-cap commentator, former broker, strategist, writer and technical analyst with 22,000 followers on X.
Lift’s stated mission is to offer investor services to small-caps while pursuing acquisitions, though it has struggled with shrinking IR budgets and a lack of corporate opportunities.
David Richards’ firm will be rebranded under the proudly regional banner of Yorkshire AI
On Monday, that story changed. Lift is buying a small stake in industrial analytics group IntelliAM AI from YAIL, Richards is moving from non-exec to executive chairman, and Lift will rebrand as Yorkshire AI. There, the headline I should have given you at the top.
The plan from here is to build a portfolio of applied AI companies across manufacturing, healthcare, finance and beyond. Lift as Yorkshire AI will also get early access to YAIL’s pipeline of emerging ventures.
Now, some people assume AI cannot exist outside a 100-mile radius of Silicon Valley, or at best in the Oxbridge to London tech triangle. But innovation does not recognise postcodes. Yorkshire AI has the chance to stand alongside successful regional venture firms such as Mercia and Maven, as well as IP Group and Frontier IP, champions of university spinouts.
Whether Aquis, an admittedly illiquid market, is the perfect launchpad is debatable. But as someone who wants to see homegrown growth stories thrive, I genuinely hope Richards and his Yorkshire team make this one fly.
Initially up 7 per cent, the stock ended the week where it started at 0.4p, giving a mini-microcap valuation of just under £430,000.
Turning to the wider market, the AIM All Share was down 1.55 per cent at 734 as it felt the trickle-down impact of the big US sell-off this week. Its benchmark, the FTSE 100, lost 2.2 per cent.
It was a tough week for Empyrean Energy investors with the shares down 67 per cent. The source of the pain is a dispute with WNEL, which served a forced-withdrawal notice over a $790,000 cash-call dispute, effectively threatening Empyrean’s stake in the Duyung gas project. The company says the move pre-empts ongoing negotiations and is preparing to challenge it, possibly via arbitration.
The biggest faller, down 71 per cent, was Bigblu Broadband, which announced its intention to quit the market. It was a familiar refrain, repeating the line trotted out by scores of companies this year that have made the same decision. In a nutshell, the constraints of a listing no longer suit its size.
The week’s big riser, up 37 per cent, was a story of following-on interest after last week’s news, specifically growing confidence around its Ewoyaa licence in Ghana.
Down 89 per cent year to date, shares in Litigation Capital Management were up 29 per cent on no news but reasonable volume. A former colleague used to call this ‘nosey buying’. But what do these speculators know?
Genedrive ended the week 29 per cent more valuable than it started after it landed a £1 million shareholder loan, which one assumes takes the funding pressure off the rapid tests specialist. It probably also averts a dilutive discounted fundraiser, which would explain the relief rally.
And finally, we have seen a Lazarus-like resurgence for ITM Power, which is up 108 per cent year to date.
On Friday its shares rose 6 per cent after the hydrogen power specialist said it had been selected by Stablegrid Group to supply technology for two energy infrastructure projects in Germany with a combined capacity of 710 MW.
The projects will use electrolysers to support grid balancing by converting surplus renewable power into hydrogen stored in underground caverns.
The company said the first project, a 30 MW plant in Rüstringen, is expected to reach a final investment decision in 2026, with Stablegrid reserving production capacity.
A second project of 680 MW is planned to enter pre-FEED work in January 2026, with an investment decision targeted for 2028.
For all the market’s breaking small- and mid-cap news, go to www.proactiveinvestors.co.uk
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