The UK is home to a growing medtech sector, spanning surgical robotics, diagnostics, medical devices, wearables, and remote patient monitoring.
Using Beauhurst data, we’ve ranked the top 100 medtech companies in the UK by total equity raised. Together, these companies have secured £6.79b in equity funding, with CMR Surgical and Oxford Nanopore Technologies both having raised more than £1b.
This isn’t a ranking of the UK’s largest medical device companies by revenue or headcount. Instead, it shows which UK medtech companies have attracted the most equity investment.
The UK medtech sector
Medtech — short for medical technology — covers the devices, instruments, and systems used to prevent, diagnose, monitor, and treat health conditions.
That includes everything from surgical robots and diagnostic equipment to implantable devices, wearable monitors, and the software that powers them.
The companies in our analysis broadly fall into three areas:
- Surgical robotics and intervention: Technology used during medical procedures or inside the body.
- Diagnostics and imaging: Devices and technology used to identify and monitor health conditions.
- Implantables, wearables, and remote monitoring: Technology that can stay with patients beyond the hospital or clinic.
There’s plenty of crossover between these areas. A third of the 108 companies we analysed are also classified as clinical diagnostics businesses on the Beauhurst platform. Manufacturing applies to 27%, application software to 22%, and electronics hardware to 21%.
It shows just how broad modern medtech has become. Many of today’s medical technology companies combine healthcare with software, data, electronics, and advanced engineering.
The sector has also grown considerably. There are 108 companies in our cohort today, compared with 70 at the end of 2015 — an increase of 54% over the past decade.
Between them, these businesses have completed 857 equity fundraisings.
However, the number of new companies entering the sector has slowed. Six or seven companies in our cohort were founded each year between 2017 and 2019, compared with around one a year since 2023.
So while fewer new businesses are appearing, many of the UK’s existing medtech companies are continuing to scale.
Medtech funding in the UK
Funding is concentrated among a relatively small group of companies.
The top 100 companies in our ranking have raised £6.79b between them, accounting for 97% of the £7.01b raised across the wider 108-company cohort.
CMR Surgical leads the ranking with £1.03b in equity funding, closely followed by Oxford Nanopore Technologies with £1.01b.
Diploma PLC follows with £426m, while Nexeon has raised £324m and Quanta £294m.
Together, the top five companies account for 45% of all equity raised by the top 100. The top 10 account for 57%.
There’s a long tail after that. Eleven companies have raised at least £100m, while 74 have raised less than £50m and 33 have raised less than £20m.
The minimum needed to make the top 100 is currently £11.3m.
Where are the UK’s medtech companies?
The UK’s medtech sector has a strong presence across the ‘golden triangle’ of London, Oxford, and Cambridge.
The South East has the largest representation in our ranking, with 23 of the top 100 companies. London follows with 20 and the East of England with 19.
Together, those three regions account for 62 of the companies in the ranking.
But UK medtech isn’t limited to the South East.
The remaining 38 businesses are spread across 11 other regions. Scotland has eight companies in the top 100, while Northern Ireland has five. The West Midlands and South West each have six.
This gives the UK medtech sector a broader geographical spread than its funding figures might initially suggest.
Medtech companies by stage of growth
The sector also looks relatively mature compared with many other areas of technology.
Across the wider cohort of 108 companies, 36 are at the growth stage, 34 are established, and 32 are at the venture stage. Just two are at the seed stage.
That’s partly down to the nature of medtech itself.
Bringing a new medical device to market can involve lengthy product development, clinical testing, regulatory approval, and procurement processes. As a result, medtech companies can spend years raising capital before reaching full commercial scale.
The same pattern appears in funding activity. Of the 857 equity rounds recorded across the cohort, 365 were completed at venture stage and 222 at growth stage, compared with 180 at seed stage.
