Why now

AI is becoming abundant and data a financial asset, and the companies that build trusted foundations for both will shape the next digital economy. Scotland has the founders to build them, but too few investors compete for them, first-time equity deals are still below their 2021 peak, and ambitious founders, with a big idea or simply the drive to find one, usually leave for London or the United States to raise.

We want to change both sides of that market, making Scotland the place where innovators build and where venture funds and international investors need to be.

Starting where the need is immediate

We will begin with digital assets and trusted AI, which need a response now and where Scotland's Roadmap for Digital Assets and Tokenisation gives us a first market. The model, however, scales across other technologies, and we would rather not restrict how people choose to innovate at the earliest stages of building a company.

Why us

We have done this before. The Digital TRUST Centre of Excellence funded development at Stableport and Stabledrop through its Future Payments Challenge, took part in the Bank of England's DLT Innovation Challenge and saw its evidence cited by the House of Lords Financial Services Regulation Committee.

Those years taught us as much through what was hard as through what worked, from how one late payment can sink a team to how good companies stall without investors to take them further. Above all, they showed that Edinburgh has no shortage of ambitious founders but lacks the no-strings-attached support they find elsewhere, which we believe drives brain drain from Scottish universities and the wider economy. This proposal brings those multi-year learnings together in a package we are confident will deliver impact at scale.

A different starting point

TRUST adds to Scotland's existing support by starting from investment. With private investors, we will offer models that give founders the freedom to innovate, pivot and test ideas, investing through a SAFE (a simple agreement for future equity) and taking no intellectual property, so a team keeps what it builds.

It sits where government support, the private sector and the startup ecosystem meet, and it draws on hubs in San Francisco, Tallinn, London and Singapore, where the right support has produced an explosion of new companies.

A physical space in Scotland

We will build TRUST 2030 as a high-quality, modern space in Edinburgh, sized for the first cohort and close to the city's universities and other institutions, where ambitious founders join us in person and work alongside academics, industry and other builders, with access to the centre's own compute and resources, in what we intend to be an exciting place to work and a central part of the proposition.

We believe public money should go only where it changes a private decision, so we propose a simple split in which every pound invested in a TRUST 2030 company is 30p from public finance and 70p from investors. Public money shares the risk, and investors gain a reason to back founders earlier than they otherwise would.

Investment

The intent is a platform where investor capital and public finance are both used well, with investors incentivised to invest in Scotland's innovation ecosystem and the Scottish Government's innovation funding magnified. Investors meet supported teams in AI and the digital economy, with founder relationships and technical expertise from us and demand testing from industry partners, while shared support is publicly funded so their money goes into companies, not overheads.

In return, investors put their own capital at risk, hold agreed rights to equity returns and make the investment decisions.

Additionality

Additionality means investments that would not otherwise happen. We will measure it by whether our support changed the decision, investor capital per public pound (the target is £2.33), new and repeat investors, and whether investors keep investing once public support steps back, and we will track customers, further funding, jobs in Scotland, research and graduate placements, with teams that close kept in the record.

Terms

The public 30p could invest on commercial, equal terms, as Scottish Enterprise's Co-investment Fund does, or on softer concessional terms, which is for negotiation, and anything preferential would need its own agreement.

Governance

Investors make the investment decisions, while public partners agree the mandate at the outset and see the results without sitting on deals. A small independent board and team run the programme and report yearly on outcomes, with no complex conditions on founders or investors, and before launch we settle the legal structure, founder terms, conflicts and rights to returns.

Who we want to hear from

Investors.

Venture funds and angels who back early teams and would shape selection and founder terms with us.

Public partners.

Government, its agencies and public funders who want public money to draw in private investment.

University and industry.

Academic and industry input to support the centre, from technical expertise and facilities to customer trials.

Long-termist institution building

TRUST is intended to be a long-termist institution that keeps working after public support steps back, sustained by returns from its investments and by investors who keep backing it on the strength of its success, because a long-term model should not depend on a call on public money. For now we are seeking investment from Scottish Enterprise to bootstrap TRUST, co-design the model and share in its long-term story, and in time we expect that partnership may no longer need direct funding.

The ask

We are seeking partners and collaborators to help us found what we believe will be an exciting, visionary centre in Edinburgh. We plan to submit a proposal to Scottish Enterprise by the end of 2026, so if this is worth building, please reach out to Peter (p.ferry@napier.ac.uk) or James (j.ball@napier.ac.uk).