Atheni raises £350,000 to move organisations beyond surface-level use of AI

London, 28 May 2026: Atheni, the AI adoption company founded by Mackenzie Howe and Louise Ballard, has raised £350,000 to build a platform that scales a proven methodology for using AI well across organisations. Developed through two years of client work prior to this raise, Atheni is now encoding that methodology into a platform designed to deliver personalised, in-work guidance at scale. Atheni is backed by angel investors including Alex Chesterman OBE and is supported by Innovate UK.

The raise comes as the gap between access to AI and meaningful use continues to grow. While most employees now have access to powerful tools, few move beyond basic use or understand how to apply them to improve judgement, decision-making and outcomes. The risk is not just underuse, but misuse: more output, less thought, with lower quality dressed up as productivity. Atheni's approach focuses on building capability across teams through guidance embedded in day-to-day work, rather than one-off workshops.

Over two years, Atheni has tested its approach across sectors from further education in South Wales to executive education at Durham University Business School, from manufacturing in the North East to FCA-regulated financial services and private equity, consistently achieving adoption rates above 90 per cent within 90 days. The funding now builds this into the Atheni Accelerator, a browser-based platform that sits alongside tools such as ChatGPT, Claude and Copilot, giving each person specific guidance for their role and giving leaders a way to measure whether AI capability is actually building.

Mackenzie Howe, co-founder and CEO of Atheni, said: “Most AI startups are building better tools. At Atheni, we are building master craftspeople. Organisations can tell you how many people have access to AI, but not whether anyone is using it to think more clearly, challenge an assumption or do work they couldn't do before. That is the gap. Atheni measures it and shows organisations how to close it.” Louise Ballard, co-founder of Atheni, added: “AI is the Ferrari in the driveway, but most people are still driving it to the shops. Atheni shows people what it can really do, in the work they are already doing.”

Alex Chesterman OBE said: “I try to back founders who see what others don't, early. Louise and Mackenzie spotted two years ago what's only now becoming obvious; that buying AI tools and using them isn't the same as actually changing how people work. The gap between those who can use AI effectively and those who can't is about to become one of the most expensive problems in business. Almost nobody is focused on solving this at the depth and scale it needs and I'm excited to be backing Atheni as part of the solution.”

Atheni is rolling out the platform with existing clients ahead of a further raise later this year to support wider scale. The company is one of a small number of fully female-led teams in the UK to secure equity investment, in a market where just 1.75 per cent of UK equity investment went to such founders in 2025, according to Beauhurst.

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