- THENA Capital has closed its inaugural £45 million Fund I: the first all-female GP-led fund to receive backing from the British Business Bank’s Enterprise Capital Funds programme.
- In its first year, the fund has backed five UK medtech companies, one of which has already launched in the US in collaboration with the Mayo Clinic, and another that has received MHRA CE marking for IVD status.
- The LP base includes Baroness Martha Lane Fox, chair of BlackRock Switzerland, and senior executives from GSK, Novartis, AstraZeneca, Carlyle, and Hellman & Friedman: over 50% of whom are women.
The structural argument for specialist medtech capital in the UK has been made many times. THENA Capital is doing things differently, with five portfolio companies in its first year, a Mayo Clinic collaboration, an MHRA regulatory approval, and an NHS Innovation Accelerator selection before the fund has even finished deploying.
London-based VC firm has closed Fund I at £45 million, following a first close of £27 million in March 2025. The fund is anchored by the British Business Bank’s Enterprise Capital Funds programme, making THENA the first all-female General Partner-led fund to receive ECF backing.
Fund I targets approximately 25 companies, investing £500k to £1 million in seed-stage digital health platforms and fast-track medical devices with a proven pathway from UK origination to US-scale commercialisation. Fund I is now fully closed.
“THENA Capital’s successful final close and strong pace of early deployment demonstrate the value of specialist investors with deep sector expertise and clear commercial focus. Through the Enterprise Capital Funds programme, we aim to support teams like THENA that are addressing structural gaps in the UK’s equity ecosystem,” says Mark Sims, managing director and head of development equity funds, British Business Bank.
“As a founding signatory of the Investing in Women Code, we are pleased to continue our partnership with an all-female investment team who have also signed the Code,” he adds.
Three founders, one thesis
THENA was founded in 2021 by three healthcare industry execs: Dr Pamela Walker Geddes, who has worked with Pfizer, Roche, Novartis, Abbott, Sanofi, Bayer, Boston Scientific, Medtronic, and GE Healthcare, and is a member of Jesus College’s Investment Committee at the University of Oxford; Esther Reynal de Saint-Michel, a McKinsey-trained commercial strategist with partnerships including GlaxoSmithKline, Reckitt, Unilever, and Johnson & Johnson; and Tatum Yount Getty, a consumer health and wellness leader who scaled SoulCycle, Tonal, and Barry’s, with commercial partnerships including Nike, Spotify, and Fitbit. Tatum also sits on the Board of Trustees of the Tate Foundation.
The thesis is specific: UK medtech produces world-class science but lacks the commercially minded, transatlantically connected capital needed to reach patients at scale. THENA’s strategy is to originate investments at UK seed valuations and build portfolio companies toward US institutional entry at Series A and beyond.
“Origination at THENA starts with a very specific question: where is exceptional UK medtech innovation being undercapitalised relative to its clinical and commercial potential? Our investments span different parts of the healthcare system, but they share the same fundamentals — strong clinical need, validated technology, a credible path to scale, and the potential to become category-defining companies driven by committed and outcomes-oriented founders,” notes Reynal de Saint-Michel.
Five companies in 12 months
THENA has already deployed into five portfolio companies across three verticals: patient support, care delivery, and medical products.
- Plexāā launched in the US market with its first product, BLOOM⁴³, and commenced a development collaboration with Mayo Clinic, which joined the cap table.
- Salient Bio received UK CE-marked IVD status from the MHRA for its IBD diagnostic test, formal regulatory validation before most seed-stage companies have a product on the market.
- Sanome closed its seed round with co-investment from THENA’s own LP base.
- Heim Health was selected for the 2026 NHS Innovation Accelerator cohort, one of the most competitive early commercialisation programmes in UK health innovation.
- Zonova completed its investment with THENA as lead, rounding out a portfolio that spans the full clinical pathway from diagnosis to treatment to patient monitoring.
“Having THENA Capital on our cap table has been invaluable. The diversity of backgrounds and expertise across their team means we benefit from a wealth of perspectives — from opening doors to health systems and the broader US ecosystem, to helping us think creatively and bringing insights that have shaped how we approach scaling from the UK into the US market,” says Saahil Mehta, founder and CEO, Plexāā.
“At the start of this fundraiser, Zonova’s greatest desire was to attract backing from investors who really ‘got’ what the company and its mission are about. THENA Capital is a dream ticket, amplified by a group of amazing investors who bring so much to the company. We’re excited to be building with them,” adds Verity Baldry, chair, Zonova.
The £45 million fund was assembled with unusual intentionality.
Over 50% of LPs are female. The investor base includes Baroness Martha Lane Fox, co-founder of Lastminute.com; Mirjam Staub-Bisang, chair and senior advisor at BlackRock Switzerland; and Patrick Healy, CEO of Hellman & Friedman.
Senior pharma executives from GSK, Novartis, and AstraZeneca sit alongside senior professionals from Carlyle, TA Associates, Vista Equity, and GHO Capital, Europe’s leading specialist healthcare fund. Family offices Firebird Collective and This Day Foundation are also committed to the fund.
The distinction matters operationally. Pharma and private equity LPs at THENA provide direct exit intelligence, informal access to M&A pathways, and the sector credibility that portfolio companies inherit from their first board meeting onward.
“The UK medtech ecosystem has never lacked talent or ambition. What it has historically lacked is the kind of commercially-minded, transatlantically-connected capital that THENA provides. Fund I closing at £45 million, in a difficult fundraising environment, and deploying into five companies in its first year is a statement about both the quality of this team and the scale of the opportunity they are addressing,” adds Ponti.
The network behind the fund
Before raising a single pound, the THENA founding team spent four years building the Future of HealthTech Hub, a community of over 400 members spanning founders, clinicians, payers, providers, pharma executives, and healthcare investors, alongside a Fellows Network of over 50 industry experts in the UK and US.
Over 20 transatlantic events have been hosted to date. The origination advantage this creates compounds with every fund cycle: as portfolio company founders graduate into the community as mentors, co-founders, and deal sources, the network deepens.
“What we have built in THENA is not a fund, it is a platform. The FoHH community, our transatlantic commercial network through our Fellows, and the 150+ products our team has collectively brought to market are structural advantages that took years to build. Fund I is the proof point. The five companies we have backed in this first year demonstrate exactly what is possible when the right capital meets the right support infrastructure,” says Walker Geddes.
“The people who engaged with us early did so because they understood what we were building, not because we told them to. That is the relationship we intend to have with every partner in this firm’s future. Fund I is the foundation. Fund II is where the franchise becomes visible,” adds Yount Getty.
Market context
According to Statista, the UK digital health market is projected to reach $7.45 billion by 2030, growing at a CAGR of 6.97% from 2025.
As TFN reported in its IWD 2026 analysis, female-only founded teams make up just 6% of the venture capital market, and the amount they raise has stagnated since 2016, making a £45 million ECF-backed close by an all-female GP team a structural milestone, not just a fundraising milestone.
The 01Health Series A we covered this week, another female-founded UK healthtech company backed by Balderton, underscores how the category is attracting serious institutional capital for the first time.
Fund II is where, as Yount Getty puts it, “the franchise becomes visible.” Whether THENA’s first five-year portfolio companies, one already in US deployment with Mayo Clinic, can generate the exits that validate the model is the test the next two to three years will answer.
