Stokes and Gakpo part of £4m funding round for AI wealth firm Prosper
England cricket captain Ben Stokes and Liverpool forward Cody Gakpo are part of a £4m funding round for a wealth management platform leveraging AI.
The sportsmen joined Fuel Ventures, who led the round with a £2m investment, in London-based FinTech Prosper.
Olympians Dame Jessica Ennis-Hill, Dame Sarah Storey and Tim Podcock, and footballers Ben White and Serge Gnabry are also part of the round through The Players Fund, a VC firm made up of current and former athletes.
Prosper leverages AI as part of its high-net-worth wealth management platform and has over £200m in assets under its control.
It will use the fresh injection to scale its customer base, launch its private market investment service and build out its AI platform.
Prosper co-founder Nick Perrett said that the firm can “shake up” the wealth management industry and bring it “into the 21st century”.
Prosper to pad out AI offering
Added fellow founder Ricky Knox: “With this investment, we’re excited to expand our AI-driven solutions to serve even more clients and deliver exceptional value.”
The initial angel round saw a roster of investors, including founders of Monzo, Capital One, World First, Tandem, Azimo, Embark and Comply Advantage.
Silicon Valley firm Andreessen Horowitz (A16Z), Connect Ventures, MMC Ventures, and Portfolio Ventures also invested in the angel round.
AI has fast become a tool in simplifying, sometimes, a number of tasks.
The launch of Chinese AI startup Deepseek sparked a sell off in shares for its global competitors.
It is seen as a competitor to AI products from Meta and OpenAI, and reportedly cost less than £5m to develop.
Founder of Fuel Ventures, lead fund investor in Prosper, Mark Pearson said the firm’s “use of AI to provide tailored financial help for clients at scale addresses a significant market need”, adding: “we look forward to seeing how they continue to redefine how wealth management services are delivered in 2025.”