Five early-stage companies from Edinburgh and Glasgow have been named as Scotland’s most promising young tech firms in the “Rising Stars” competition run by growth platform Tech Nation.

Edinburgh-based Kythera AI, Letting Cloud and Polydigi Tech, along with Gigged.AI and Know-it of Glasgow, join 50 other regional winners from across the UK as winners in the fourth round of the competition. All will now be inducted into the Tech Nation network, with the top 20 as decided by judges featuring in a culminating competition in front of an audience of investors and influencers from the technology sector.

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Kythera develops tools for designing artificial intelligence in 3D game engines, while the Letting Cloud platform brings everyone in the industry together to improve the way people search and let property. Polydigi Tech uses authentication solutions to protect the data and identities of companies and individuals in banking, payments and other services transactions.

Recruitment platform Giggeg.AI allows UK-based companies to find temporary tech workers for specific digital projects. Know-it, a cloud-based credit management platform, streamlines the credit control process by allowing users to monitor, mitigate risk, and collect overdue invoices all in one place.