Meet the winners of London's Al revolution

From nine-figure valuations to skyrocketing share prices, the tech industry's new AI obsession is creating a gold rush across the capital. Simon Hunt meets the entrepreneurs shaping our future

- Simon Hunt

MATI Staniszewski couldn't believe his luck. Barely more than a year after the 28-year-old founded a small AI M start-up, it hit a $100 million valuation in June. "It's exciting - we are lucky to be paving the way where others haven't been before," said Staniszewski, whose London-based company, ElevenLabs, auto-generates audio to dub films in English into foreign languages.

"Last year we approached tens of investors, and we were rejected by most of them all the attention was on the metaverse and crypto companies," he said.

"But this year everyone around us is so interested in AI, and we had loads of investors come to us. You have to take a big amount of money on board which brings a lot of responsibility... that was stressful." But there was no champagne-popping when ElevenLabs hit its nine-figure valuation milestone. Staniszewski had no time to celebrate - carving out just an hour of his day to head to an Italian joint on Portobello Road with his girlfriend to toast his achievement, before rushing back to work.

"There's just so much intensity in this space we see more and more companies trying to do the same thing as us," he said.

"My co-founder and I joke that there's no distinction between weekdays and weekends anymore every day is a work day.

"Looking back, maybe I should have done more to celebrate." Staniszewski's company is just one of hundreds of new tech firms that make up the AI revolution. A technology which not too long ago sat at the fringes of public discourse, largely confined to science fiction, has now taken centre stage in the business world, occupying far more of the lives of the biggest investors. They have poured tens of billions of pounds into the technology, intent on getting an early foothold in the industry.