A Newcastle-based artificial intelligence company has raised £3m to help small and mid-sized service businesses deploy AI in practice, not just in principle. Rightbrain AI is targeting a gap that has become increasingly visible across British industry: firms that recognise the commercial case for AI but cannot translate that recognition into working systems without significant technical resource or expenditure.

The company's platform is designed for B2B service businesses, including marketing agencies, recruitment firms and professional services companies. Rather than asking clients to rebuild their technology infrastructure, Rightbrain sits across existing tools, connecting AI models from providers such as OpenAI, Anthropic and Google into software environments businesses already use, including customer relationship management systems and Google Workspace. The result is that firms can build and run AI agents without specialist developers or large-scale implementation projects. For many of these businesses, the alternative has been to either invest heavily in bespoke development or to abandon AI adoption altogether, leaving them exposed as competitors move faster.

The funding round was led by Northern Powerhouse Investment Fund II, operating through PXN Equity Finance, which directs investment across the North West of England, covering Cheshire, Cumbria, Greater Manchester, Lancashire and Merseyside. Existing investors Salica and NYDIG also participated, alongside four new angel investors. The involvement of a regionally focused fund is notable given that AI investment in the UK has tended to concentrate in London and the South East, with Northern startups historically finding it harder to attract institutional backing at early stages.

Peter Cheyne, co-founder of Rightbrain AI, said the core problem facing businesses is not access to AI technology but the ability to use it responsibly within their existing operations. "Businesses are under pressure to adopt AI, but many are finding that the real challenge isn't accessing the technology but actually deploying it safely and effectively," he said. "We're helping traditional B2B services evolve into AI-native businesses by embedding agents into their core workflows. This removes friction, giving teams a single platform to build, deploy and govern intelligent tools without needing to rebuild their infrastructure or hire specialist developers."

Rightbrain intends to use the capital to make targeted hires in response to growing customer demand and to expand its partner programme both domestically and internationally. The company also plans to deploy its own platform to manage customer identification, qualification and conversion, effectively using its product to run its own sales operation. It is a deliberate signal to prospective clients that the technology works under commercial pressure, not just in controlled demonstrations.

The raise reflects a broader shift in where investor attention is settling within the AI market. Early funding cycles were dominated by foundational model development and large enterprise transformation programmes. Attention is now moving towards companies that make AI usable at the operational level for businesses that lack the budget or internal capability to build from scratch. The appeal is straightforward: rather than selling ambition, these platforms sell outcomes that can be implemented without months of consultancy and infrastructure work. For SMEs in particular, the market for practical, integration-led AI tooling is expanding quickly as the pressure to adopt AI increases but the means to do so independently remains limited for most. Rightbrain's positioning, focusing on deployment and governance rather than model development, places it directly in that space and, if the partner programme scales as intended, could give it reach well beyond its Northern English base.

‍