PolyAI raises $86M

London-based AI startup PolyAI has raised $86 million in a Series D funding round.

The funding round in the AI assistant developer for call centres was co-led by existing investors Canadian B2B software investor Georgian, London-based investor Hedosophia and US VC firm Khosla Ventures.

Additional investors were NVentures (Nvidia’s VC arm), Sands Capital, Squarepoint Ventures, Citi Ventures, Point72 Ventures and the British Business Bank, which invested £15m ($20.1m). The British Business Bank is also a major LP in UK VC funds.

The London-based startup, which did not declare a valuation following its raise, says it will use the funding to advance its tech, as it looks to increase its enterprise customer numbers.

PolyAI works with major businesses, amid growing enterprise 24/7 demand for call centre support, which suffers from high attrition rates.

It says it has over 100 enterprise customers, including Las Vegas casinos, Hilton and Marriott hotel chains, US delivery service FedEx, and the financial institution Unicredit.

The University of Cambridge spinout has developed AI voice assistants for call centres which guide customers through enquiries, handling millions of calls, which can, some say, sound indistinguishable from human voices.

PolyAI has worked with linguists to build voice assistants that reflect human speech patterns and the voices can be tailored by accent, tone and vocabulary. The tech can complete many tasks a customer service rep can, including taking payment information as well as names, addresses and account numbers.

PolyAI uses its own proprietary AI models as well as models from major model companies like OpenAI and DeepSeek.

Last year, PolyAI raised $50m in funding, valuing it at close to $500m.

The Series C was led by investors Hedosophia and NVentures. It has previously raised $66m from investors.

Nikola Mrkšić, CEO and co-founder, PolyAI, said: "This Series D financing is proof of the industry’s confidence in our abilities and the potential of our technology.

“This investment will kick-start the next stage of our growth cycle and ensure that we can continue to deliver best-in-class technology for enterprises looking to transform their customer and employee experience.”

Chancellor of the exchequer, Rachel Reeves, said: “We are investing in companies like PolyAI so we can grow the economy and create good jobs. Our backing, combined with our world‑leading universities, strong private investment, and our AI Growth Zones makes the UK one of the best places in the world to build an AI startup."