Ignite Funding Partners launches as £1m to £25m lender led by former ThinCats chief Ravi Anand

Ignite Funding Partners, a new UK specialist lender founded by Ravi Anand, formerly Managing Director of ThinCats, launched on 20 October 2026, offering facilities of between £1 million and £25 million to established UK businesses, according to the company.

Ignite said £500 million of lending capital is being lined up from institutional investors. It did not name the investors or say how much had been committed at launch. The company said its loans are intended to support organic growth, acquisitions, ownership transitions and refinancing.

Who it lends to

Ignite said it focuses on the larger end of the SME market: proven businesses with strong management teams that are building momentum and scaling. It said these firms are often too large for non-bank lenders focused on smaller SMEs, while mainstream lenders “have lost the skills to effectively serve their needs”.

The company cited the Office for National Statistics’ “Business population estimates for the UK and regions 2025” release. According to Ignite’s reading of that release, the 260,000 businesses with 10 to 249 employees make up 4.5% of the UK private sector but account for 28.7% of private sector employment and 31.2% of private sector turnover.

Ignite also said its own analysis of 750,000 mid-sized firms between 2007 and 2025 found that mid-sized SMEs that borrow to invest in growth are three times more likely to grow revenue at inflation plus 50% than those that do not borrow. It estimates the addressable market at about £12 billion a year. Both are company estimates.

The team and its record

Anand said: “Strong and growing businesses are vital to the UK economy, and they deserve a lender that understands them and backs them to enable their growth. Our job is simple: to provide the capital needed to power the momentum they have created. As entrepreneurs ourselves, we know how business founders think and operate and the challenges they face, so we have created a funding platform which helps them by being relationship-focused, flexible and transparent. Backing ambition is the most exciting part of what we do. Ignite combines a highly experienced team with AI tools which together ensure we can provide the right funding to scale businesses. We will be a genuine, long-term partner to businesses, their advisers and investors, in every region of the UK.”

Ignite said Anand has recruited senior ThinCats colleagues who together provided more than £2.5 billion of funding to UK businesses over the last 10 years. It also said that by deal volume ThinCats was ranked in the top two lenders in 2023, 2024 and 2025, citing Experian. It did not name the colleagues who have joined.

Anand’s role at ThinCats is corroborated by independent coverage. Crowdfund Insider reported in August 2024 that he was Managing Director of ThinCats when the lender secured £75 million of mezzanine funding from CPP Investments. The same report said ThinCats lent £378 million to SMEs in its financial year ending 30 July 2024 and offered funding of “from £1m up to £20m” per business.

According to Ignite, Anand has more than 35 years of experience across private credit, investment banking and asset management, and was Managing Director of ThinCats until 2025. It said he previously held senior roles at Dexion Capital, New Star Asset Management and HSBC Investment Bank, qualified as a chartered accountant with KPMG, and is a non-executive director of Capital Gearing Trust PLC.

How the lender says it will work

Ignite described its approach as relationship-led, with a consistent appetite, flexible funding structures and open communication. It said it uses data and purpose-built AI agents to analyse company information quickly, leaving human judgement to focus on the decisions that matter. The company said it will work with the regional corporate finance community and private equity investors.

Company record

Companies House shows Ignite Funding Partners Limited, company number 17244100, as an active company incorporated on 26 May 2026, with a registered office in Canary Wharf, London. Its nature of business is listed as SIC code 64921, credit granting by non-deposit taking finance houses and other specialist consumer credit grantors. The officers page lists one current officer, Ravinder Singh Anand, appointed as a director on 26 May 2026.

The company was incorporated less than five months before the launch. Ignite’s release did not say whether it holds, or needs, any authorisation from the Financial Conduct Authority for its lending activity.

The release did not give details of interest rates, fees, security requirements, the date of a first loan, or the size of the team.