The transaction facilitates a successful exit for early investor BGF, which first backed Optima in 2022. The deal delivered a 4x return on investment for BGF, which has chosen to reinvest alongside GCP as a minority shareholder to support the consultancy’s continued trajectory.

Founded in 2013 by Alan Crawley and accelerated in 2021 through a partnership with academic Dr Chris Foley, Optima specialises in bridging the gap between academic mathematics and business strategy. The firm helps blue-chip clients in sectors such as financial services, energy, telecoms, and pharmaceuticals to tackle complex challenges through machine learning and advanced engineering.

GCP’s investment will fuel several strategic growth initiatives designed to scale Optima further, investing in customer success, enhancing its service and innovation propositions, expanding strategic marketing, accelerating talent development, and growing its position in the UK and European markets.

Mr Crawley, founder of Optima Partners, said: “Since its launch, Optima has gone from strength to strength, expanding our capabilities, growing our team and deepening our impact across a range of critical sectors.

“The launch of our health data science division, bioXcelerate AI, has been a major milestone, reflecting the scale of opportunity we see as organisations look to make better use of data and advanced analytics. The backing and continued support from BGF has been instrumental in helping us reach this stage of our growth.

“This investment from GCP marks the start of an exciting new chapter. It gives us the momentum to build on our success, accelerate our plans and continue developing the capabilities that will define the next stage of Optima’s journey.”

Optima enters this new partnership with strong momentum. In 2024 alone, the company delivered 40% revenue growth and has increased its headcount by over 90% in the last two years, opening additional offices in London and Bristol.

Dr Foley, CEO, added: “Our focus is firmly on enabling the next phase of Optima’s growth. GCP’s investment is a strong endorsement of our mission to help our clients turn their data, analytics and AI strategies into measurable outcomes at speed. This funding allows us to accelerate our growing track record of innovation, invest further in our people, and strengthen the infrastructure required to support our clients at greater scale.

“With this partnership, we can move faster to help organisations understand, adapt and enhance human- and data-led decision-making supported by AI, bridging academic foundations with industry-focused and value-based impact.”

Richard Shaw, partner, GCP, said: “Alan, Chris and the wider Optima team have built a highly differentiated business at the intersection of advanced data science, machine learning and enterprise transformation.

“As organisations increasingly seek to harness their data and accelerate AI adoption, Optima is uniquely positioned to help them tackle mission-critical challenges and unlock meaningful commercial outcomes.

“The business has already demonstrated impressive momentum and scale, supported by strong leadership, deep technical skill sets and robust industry expertise. We are delighted to partner with the team at this exciting stage of their journey and are looking forward to working together to enhance go-to-market capability, strengthen organisational infrastructure and scale delivery capacity in a rapidly growing and strategically important sector.”

Richard Pugh, investor, BGF, said: “Since our initial investment in 2022, Optima has seen exceptional growth and development, both in terms of its team and its abilities to revolutionise organisations’ use of data and advanced analytics.

“This is a fantastic result for both BGF and the Optima team. Our backing has supported Alan’s ambitious vision and combined with Chris’ expertise and direction, the business is in an ideal position to gather pace and seize the huge opportunities arising in AI and data.

“It has been a pleasure working with Alan and Chris over the years and we look forward to continuing our backing as a minority shareholder, supporting the business as it embarks on this next phase of growth alongside GCP.”

Michael Berger, portfolio director, BGF, added: “This transaction represents a very successful exit for BGF and a strong endorsement of what Alan, Chris and the team have built at Optima since our investment in 2022.

“The business is now firmly established as a leader in applied data and AI, and we’re delighted to have backed this period of its growth, while also reinvesting alongside GCP as Optima moves into its next stage of development.”