Ethos

London-based AI recruitment and expert matching startup Ethos has secured a £16.7 million ($22.75 million) Series A funding round. The investment was led by top-tier Silicon Valley investor Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), with participation from Evantic, XTX Markets, and General Catalyst (which previously led the company's seed round in 2024).

Summary of transaction details:

• Value: £16.7 million ($22.75 million) Series A
• Sector: Recruitment & HR / Artificial Intelligence
• Advisor: Not disclosed
• Key Entities: Target: Ethos; Lead Investor: Andreessen Horowitz (a16z); Participating Investors: General Catalyst, XTX Markets, Evantic Capital, Common Magic; Key Founders: James Lo (CEO), Daniel J. Mankowitz (CTO)
• Location: London, UK

Note: Co-founded by a former SoftBank/McKinsey executive (Lo) and a former Google DeepMind research scientist (Mankowitz), Ethos is tackling the broken, CV-reliant recruitment market—a problem exacerbated by the recent flood of AI-generated resumes. Rather than matching static job titles, Ethos uses an AI matching engine that evaluates a candidate's actual real-world expertise. The platform conducts automated voice interviews and reads vast amounts of public data—including academic papers, GitHub repositories, and professional portfolios—to map an individual's comparative advantage. The platform is currently onboarding thousands of professionals a week across finance, tech, healthcare, and skilled trades, connecting them with paid opportunities, expert calls, fractional roles, and full-time jobs at elite AI labs, hedge funds, and consultancies.