This year’s Silicon Gorge competition brought together 24 of the South West’s most exciting early-stage startups, each on a mission to raise investment and scale.

Now the pitching is done, we’re turning the spotlight onto the brilliant businesses who made it to the semi-finals and the investor showcase. Over the next few weeks, we’ll be sharing a series of founder interviews. We’ll diving into their journeys so far, the challenges they’re solving and what they’re looking for next.

Next up in the series is: Lewis Bowen, Co-Founder and CEO at Pontiro.

1.  What does your company do?

Pontiro automates the anonymisation of medical imaging data, enabling secure, compliant, and scalable data sharing to power AI in healthcare.

2.  What problem are you trying to solve?

Manual anonymisation is slow, error-prone, and a major barrier to innovation in healthcare. It blocks research, delays AI adoption, and risks patient privacy.

3.  What makes your solution unique?

Pontiro is purpose-built for clinical workflows, automating anonymisation in seconds while ensuring full compliance. We’re also developing post-quantum encryption to future-proof healthcare data privacy.

4.  What are you most proud of so far?

We’ve anonymised over 10,000 real patient studies in NHS pilots and secured partnerships with Cardiff University and the Cyber Innovation Hub.
Image Showing Pontiro CEO Lewis Bowen

5.  How much are you raising and what do you want to use investment for?

We’re raising £500,000 (SEIS-qualified) to enhance product integration, advance our encryption roadmap, and scale adoption across UK healthcare.

6.  What tools/people/services/organisations helped you most?

Cardiff University, the NHS AI Implementation Group, Cyber Innovation Hub, Life Sciences Hub Wales, and our network of NHS advisors.

7.  Where can we find out more about you?To learn more:

🌐 Website: www.pontiro.com
🔗 LinkedIn: Pontiro

Image Showing Silicon Gorge 2025 Thank You Sponsors

Will Humphrey

IAP Investment Silicon Gorge Startups