Techscaler’s Ones to Watch 2025: Scotland’s Next Wave of High-Growth Startups

At CodeBase, we spend our days alongside founders. We see the long nights, the big bets, the moments of doubt, and the sparks of momentum that turn ideas into thriving companies. It’s why we have shaped Techscaler by CodeBase into what it is today: a platform lowering barriers, sharing networks, and creating conditions where more of these journeys succeed.

The idea of Ones to Watch grows out of those conversations. It’s based on what we see every day across our hubs and programmes: founders solving urgent problems, teams building with ambition, and companies that have the potential to scale into market leaders.

This October, we’re releasing the second edition of Ones to Watch, highlighting the startups shaping Scotland’s tech future. It highlights 16 extremely promising startups shaping the future of Scotland’s tech economy, alongside insights into the broader ecosystem and the sectors where momentum is building.

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A Growing Ecosystem with Global Ambition

Scotland’s tech sector is entering a new chapter. More founders are choosing Scotland as the place to start, grow, and scale their companies. We see it in the energy across our hubs, in the quality of ideas coming through our programmes, and in the networks of founders, investors, and partners that are becoming stronger every year. In the first quarter alone, over £100 million was invested in Scottish startups, even as the wider UK market slowed. By mid-year, research showed Scotland accounting for around 12% of all UK equity deals, up from 9% just two years ago.

In addition to the positive story arc, the investment data tells that there is a shift happening on the ground as well. We’re seeing more diverse founding teams, companies aiming for global markets from day one, and a growing spread of specialisms in areas such as health, AI, and climate.

Driving this growth is a combination of factors: Scotland’s world-class universities, specialised clusters in healthtech, AI, climate, and space, and the

collaborative infrastructure that brings founders, investors, and partners together.

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Lessons from Last Year’s Ones to Watch

The inaugural Ones to Watch in 2024 surfaced companies that are now scaling rapidly.

• Wordsmith, a productivity toolkit for in-house lawyers, enables legal teams to support their organisations with contract reviews, template drafts, and policy guidance on demand. It was featured in our last edition for its strong team, deep technical IP, and early investor interest. Since then, the company has secured a $25m Series A, one of Scotland’s largest early-stage raises, to scale its AI-powered toolkit for in-house legal teams.
• Simple Online Healthcare, a digital platform that enables patients to manage their health with online assessment, was spotlighted last year for rapid user and revenue growth. The company has since tripled revenues to £66m and entered the Danish market, becoming one of Scotland’s strongest examples of bootstrapped international scale.

These outcomes validate why we put them on the list. The right signals at the right time often point to companies on the path to breakout success.

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A Glimpse Inside the 2025 Ones to Watch

There’s no single formula for predicting which startups will break through, but there are patterns. We look at a mix of factors, from founding team strength to early user traction, IP depth, sector potential, investor confidence, and much more. Each company in this year’s Ones to Watch demonstrates one or more of these signals in a way that sets them apart. Here are four examples from the 16 companies featured this year that illustrate the potential of the featured ones quite well:

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An AI-agent licensing and enforcement platform for highly regulated sectors and public authorities. By automating workflows and compliance, Epass is solving a costly challenge faced by governments and large organisations worldwide. It made the list thanks to strong user growth and a product tackling a global pain point.

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A next-generation virtual workspace for life sciences, bringing together data, literature, experiments, and protocols into one interactive map. Amytis is designed to accelerate how scientists generate insights, with investment momentum showing belief in its vision.

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Specialists in LiDAR technology, Digiflec is creating digital models of outdoor environments that can be applied to infrastructure, mobility, and climate resilience. Their combination of technical depth and commercial relevance earned them a place on this year’s list.

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Leading in AI odour detection by combining insect intelligence with digital technology to identify diseases and pests. With a rich IP base and an experienced founding team, Arctech represents Scotland’s growing strength at the intersection of life sciences and AI.

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These are just a few of the ventures driving Scotland’s tech story forward. The full Ones to Watch 2025 report further includes notable features such as Glitchers, Persi, AskVinny, Neurolabs, and more. Want to see in-depth why each company was chosen? Dive into the report itself.

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Health and Medtech: A Core Growth Story

Across the 16 companies featured this year, we’re seeing momentum in several areas: digital health and medtech, AI-driven platforms, deeptech applications like space and LiDAR, and new models in consumer marketplaces. These aren’t just isolated startups; together they hint at the strengths that are shaping Scotland’s next chapter of tech growth.

One of the clearest signals is in health and medtech. The sector has grown steadily over the past decade and now includes more than 200 companies employing 9,000 people. What makes this momentum exciting is how closely it connects to global needs: earlier diagnostics, more personalised care, and healthcare systems under pressure to do more with less.

Companies like Infix, developing cloud-based scheduling to ease hospital bottlenecks, show what is possible. By turning complex science and healthcare challenges into scalable products, these startups underline why medtech is becoming one of Scotland’s defining specialisms and why the world is paying attention.

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Why Ones to Watch Matters

The Ones to Watch exists to shine a light on the founders building the next generation of high-growth companies, and to connect them with the wider ecosystem. For investors, it signals where opportunities are emerging. For partners, it highlights the innovations reshaping industries. And for policymakers, it shows where momentum is building and what it will take to sustain it.

For us at CodeBase, it’s a reminder of why we do what we do. By bringing these stories together, we hope to make it easier for founders to find the support they need and for Scotland’s ecosystem to grow stronger as a whole.

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Hear from the Ecosystem

^“There are all these opportunities that just continue to come from the Techscaler programme with CodeBase._{Olivia Parkes, Founder of Persi}

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Scotland has a proud history of medical innovation, from pioneering discoveries in the past to cutting-edge medtech companies today. That foundation gives us a unique strength to build on, and we’re starting to see a spike in medtech startup activity, supported by a wide range of initiatives.
_{Andrew McGinley, EIR at CodeBase and Founder of Hosel and Care Sourcer}‍