Former Meta president of global affairs and former UK deputy prime minister Nick Clegg has joined HIRO Capital, a founder-led VC firm, to invest in spatial AI — the emerging foundation for robotics, AR, autonomous systems, and immersive computing.
Clegg will serve as a General Partner alongside Luke Alvarez, Cherry Freeman, and gaming industry icon Ian Livingstone in the new HIRO III fund, which aims to deploy €500M+ into Europe’s scale-up ecosystem.
In a major addition to the fund’s expertise, Yann LeCun — who recently stepped down as Meta’s Chief AI Scientist — will join HIRO’s advisory board.
🔹 Why Spatial AI, Why Europe?
Clegg said the team shares a belief that the next era of technology will be defined by spatial, immersive computing:
“Europe has deep laboratory and academic expertise that will become increasingly relevant.”
He also pushed back on pessimism about Europe’s tech prospects:
“We’re a continent of 500 million people with some of the best researchers and an increasingly vibrant startup scene.”
🔹 Investment Focus
HIRO has already identified opportunities across:
- Robotics
- Sports & gaming tech
- Defence innovation
- Spatial computing (orientation, navigation, autonomy)
The fund will target investments between €5M and €50M, helping fill Europe’s critical gap in scale-up capital.