Start-up Ve spurns sceptical City for US float

The boss of a London-based start-up eyeing the biggest ever float for a British unicorn has ruled out a UK listing.

David Brown, founder of Ve Interactive, criticised the “negative” attitude to loss-making tech firms here which he claims has been worsened by Brexit.

The business, which helps clients such as Liverpool FC to increase online sales, is in talks with investment banks including Goldman Sachs about a multi-billion-dollar float in New York later this year, but is also considering other institutional funding options.

Ve’s last investment round valued it at $2.7 billion, making it a unicorn company – a tech start-up with a $1 billion price tag.

“There’s not a chance we’d consider a London float. There’s a lack of liquidity and a lack of positivity,” Brown told the Standard.

“Recent Brexit negativity that’s still out there and the uncertainty around it is pushing Britain’s chances of a really good, strong stock market, in terms of flotations and tech, further away — and I think the US are laughing and lapping it up. They know they’re the only option in the world now.”

He added: “In the UK, I don’t think we’re at the races in terms of private equity and tech confidence. You hear a lot more negative stories than you hear positive.

“It’s a shame because you’ve got to put something in to get something out. At lot of the time capital need is seen as a significant negative because people don’t want to take the risks. It’s almost like we want to apologise for dreaming big. Why not think big?”

Brown added that the high-profile collapse of Dan Wagner’s tech start-up Powa “wasn’t helpful for the whole unicorn thing”.

His comments come as Ve’s newly filed accounts at Companies House showed that, in 2015, the pre-tax loss had widened to £16.5 million from £3.2 million in 2014.

Revenues rose 30% to £25.6 million, although this was a marked slowdown from over 300% growth the year before. Brown admitted the performance was flatter than he would have liked.

“We definitely got caught with having to scale the infrastructure much faster than expected,” he said.