Gaurav Chawla
Co-Founder and CEO, Lumirithmic
Gaurav Chawla is a deep-tech founder, angel investor and university mentor focused on strengthening the UK’s science-to-scale pipeline.
His work sits at the intersection of advanced research, capital markets and commercial execution. Spanning two decades across investment banking, fintech, and multiple venture-backed businesses, he has operated in high-risk environments where technical ambition must meet regulatory, financial and market realities.
Today, alongside leading Lumirithmic, an Imperial College London spinout, he invests in and mentors early-stage founders emerging from institutions including Cambridge, Oxford, Imperial and UCL. He backs companies working on enterprise AI safety, data infrastructure, advanced materials and battery technologies, sectors where the UK has research depth but faces structural barriers to scale.
His perspective is shaped by pattern recognition across startups:
Technically strong teams often underestimate execution risk;
Capital structures frequently misalign with deep-tech timelines;
Regulatory and procurement pathways remain opaque;
Data quality and operational governance are as critical as the core science.
Gaurav believes the UK’s innovation challenge is not discovery it is translation. Commercial discipline, early market engagement and better alignment between universities, investors and policymakers will determine whether frontier research becomes globally competitive companies.
Through mentoring and angel investment, he works closely with founders on commercialisation strategy, capital discipline, governance design and market entry helping bridge the gap between laboratory insight and market adoption.
Why do you support the work of The Entrepreneurs Network?
Entrepreneurs experience policy at the ground level. University incentives, tax structures, capital regulation, procurement frameworks and AI governance all materially affect whether deep-tech companies scale in the UK or relocate elsewhere.
The Entrepreneurs Network plays an important role in ensuring policy is informed by operators who understand both technical complexity and commercial constraints.
If the UK wants to lead in AI, energy and advanced technologies, it must design systems that reward execution, not just publication.
What research should more people be reading?
The Entrepreneurs Network’s Tech Startup Manifesto is essential reading, particularly its focus on scaling barriers and the funding gap between early-stage and growth capital.
I would also point to the House of Lords Science and Technology Committee report on Financing and Scaling UK Science and Technology. It highlights a persistent issue: the UK is strong at discovery, but weaker at building globally dominant companies in capital-intensive sectors.
Finally, the quarterly Entrepreneurs Survey is invaluable. Policy debates often rely on theory; those surveys surface the lived experience of founders navigating tax policy, capital constraints, hiring, and regulation in real time. If we want to fix the commercialisation gap in UK deep tech, we need to listen to operators and study where companies stall, not just celebrate research output.
Why is the UK an attractive place to start and grow a business?
The UK combines world-class universities with global capital markets and a strong legal framework.
The opportunity lies in strengthening risk appetite and improving the pathways between research institutions and commercial markets. With better alignment between policy, capital, and execution, the UK is well positioned to lead in deep-tech commercialisation.