Think about the south of Scotland and you’ll likely conjure images of lush countryside, rolling hills, and plenty of sheep. 

What you might not know is that hidden away in the isolated towns south of the Central Belt you’ll find a vibrant tech scene, with companies offering innovative solutions rivalling anything out of Edinburgh and Glasgow.

With a mix of disruptors, forward thinkers, and socially conscious entrepreneurs, small southern towns have everything a tech ecosystem needs to thrive. 

So which companies are proving that Scotland’s southern reaches are also a prime spot for tech innovation?

Thistle Rocketry

A Scottish space startup, Thistle Rocketry is headquartered in Galashiels and was founded in 2019. Headed up by founders David Robertson and Ian Hanley, the company is developing scalable launch and in-space propulsion systems, with a long-term view to providing a full ‘constellation maintenance service’.

In its early stages, Thistle Rocketry received a Scottish EDGE award of £100,000 in 2022 to support its first projects, which included designing and building an 8-kilonewton suborbital rocket engine.

From there the firm has developed scalable propulsion technology that could make for more cost-effective space launches, including creating a fluid driven pump that utilises rocket engine “blow down” technology, offering propellant tank savings, line redundancy and increased performance.

Although it hasn’t received any further outside investment, Thistle Rocketry’s future looks bright. Since its inception the company has added prestigious names to its board, including Dr Natasha Nicholson, a University of Edinburgh astronomer and astrobiologist, and Trevor Skelly, former VP of engineering at RTX, the multinational aerospace and defence company.

IndiNature

With a manufacturing base in picturesque Jedburgh, IndiNature is attempting to transform the construction industry with building materials that capture, rather than create, carbon. 

The firm’s goal is to drive a natural industrial revolution, making high quality, natural building products available locally around the globe – on an industrial scale and at a competitive price.

Founded in 2016 by Scott Simpson and Sam Baumber, the firm is using sustainable materials like hemp crops to make carbon negative products, including its popular IndiTherm ‘batts’, used in the building trade for energy efficiency, and its bio-based IndiBreathe wall system that can capture carbon and manage heat loss, easily retrofitted into historic buildings.

The company claims its products can reduce the average UK home’s carbon footprint by 4.4 tonnes of CO2, while also ensuring healthier indoor air thanks to the use of natural fibres.

So far, according to Dealroom, the company earned £4.3 million in funding, with backing from Scottish Enterprise, Zero Waste Scotland, and the Industrial Biotechnology Innovation Centre, and last year secured follow-on investment from the Scottish National Investment Bank for  second stage projects.

Scotmas

Located just outside the market town of Kelso, Scotmas was the first to make simple, easy-to-use chlorine dioxide products, primarily used as biocides to disinfect and decontaminate water systems, keeping them free from pathogens like Legionella.

Back in 2015, the firm won a £1.3 million funding package from HSBC to tap into new markets, with further funding coming from Scottish Enterprise. 

This year, Scotmas announced it had signed a Memorandum of Understanding with ACWA Power, an international investor and operator of water desalination plants, for the creation of ‘green desalination’ technology using the firm’s expertise in sustainable ClO2-based systems.

To that end, the company has developed what it calls ‘ultra-pure chlorine dioxide-based technology’ in the form of its patented Bravo Ultra-Pure Generators, which prevent impurities and disinfection from reaching finished water supplies, leaving a solution which has been independently tested to be 99.7% pure.

Scotmas’ hydro-tech has already been used to bring clean water to forty rural villages in Botswana, was implemented at desalination plants in Doha for the Qatar World Cup in 2022, and has helped provide clean water to villages in southern India. 

As safe water sources continue to become strained the world over, this Scottish clean-water technology can be used as a literal lifesaver.

Smart Green Shipping

Looking to revolutionise the global shipping industry is Dumfries-based Smart Green Shipping. The company’s most recent innovation is the FastRig, a lightweight, data-driven, wing-sail designed to be retrofitted to existing commercial vessels.

The retractable wing-sail is entirely manufactured in Scotland from 100% recycled materials, and promises to cut greenhouse gas emissions and operating costs, as well as reduce fuel consumption by at least 20%, for some of the biggest ships on the planet.

Announced in April this year by then first minister Humza Yousaf, the wing-sail development was supported by £1.8 million in funding from Scottish Enterprise, and £1.35 million equity investment from Japanese shipping company MOL Drybulk.

The FastRig technology is expected to benefit up to 40,000 vessels in the global merchant fleet, but the company plans to go further, with an AI optimisation tool called FastRoute to help shipping companies use its wind sail to save as much fuel as possible.   

The firm’s founder and CEO Diane Gilpin first helped develop innovative systems solutions in F1 motor racing, yacht racing, and the renewables sector, with her environmental efforts at Smart Green Shipping leading the firm to be nominated for the prestigious Earthshot Prize last year.

With the shipping industry responsible for around 940 million tonnes of CO2 annually, at least 2.5% of the world’s total CO2 emissions according to UKRI, this Scottish-based technology could have a major role to play in reducing the industry’s carbon output.

Care Reality

Offering immersive experiences through extended reality (XR) and AI technology, Care Reality is an edtech company focused on creating dynamic 3D environments for users in the health and social care sectors to learn using lifelike situations.

Founded in 2022 by CEO Ross Toomer, the company has created virtual reality learning experiences to boost the knowledge and confidence of those learning care, hygiene, and clinical skills, published on their proprietary FLO platform and accessed using Meta Quest VR headsets.

According to the company, using their virtual reality system can save over £1,800 in training costs, and results in a 230% improvement in knowledge retention.

That innovative approach to skills development is the reason the firm secured part of a £4.5 million award through last year’s Innovate UK XR-Mindset challenge, a competition aimed at developing digital therapeutic XR solutions. 

According to lead developer Jake Spreadborough, the company is branching out, and was most recently working on a Virtual Choirs project, allowing choir singers in care homes to connect through virtual reality with zero lag or delay. 

Digital Dairy Chain

Not a company, but a collective, The Digital Dairy Chain’s (DDC) mission is to disrupt the traditional dairy industry through innovation and collaboration.

Launched in Dumfries in 2022 from Scotland’s Rural College’s (SRUC) Barony campus, the DDC was awarded £21.3m from the UK Government’s Strength in Places Fund, with its initial focus being the use of sensors and data from dairy herds, but has since worked to create bio-refined grass, and is now developing a network of ‘digital twins’ for the region’s farms.

As well as the SRUC, its partners include the Universities of Strathclyde and West of Scotland, CENSIS, First Milk, and Cows and Co Group.

Led by programme director Stuart Martin, the team runs the Milk Round Accelerator, an initiative to support SMEs with technology ideas that could improve efficiency in the dairy sector, and reduce its environmental impact.

One of DDC’s success stories is Appleby Creamery, a small batch cheese producer which is making its products more sustainable through the use of IoT technology to minutely control temperatures and humidity levels at different stages of the process.

Such projects are the reason DDC was last year highlighted by Scotland’s National Innovation Strategy as helping cement southwest Scotland as a ‘go to’ region for future investment in high-tech, sustainable and regenerative food production systems.

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BONUS – 3 Exciting South of Scotland Startups to Watch

As well as being home to firmly established tech enterprises, there are some cool, new companies gaining a toehold in the south. Here’s a small taster of some of the best startups to look out for in the months to come.  

Lynchpin.AI

Former Meta product manager Christopher Noble swapped Silicon Valley for Stow when he founded Lynchpin.AI, a leadership development app and platform currently under development which aims to bring businesses context-aware guidance about past, current, and even future events to enhance productivity. 

MyFitStories

Galashiels-based founder David Catto created the exercise app MyFitStories last year as a social sports platform, helping people connect with friends and achieve fitness milestones.

What could be called the anti-Instagram, the app promotes body positivity, centred around the values of play, respect, self-growth and creativity.  

TextVizz

TextVizz is a language-based startup from Kelso, created to make hidden features of language visible. The creator, Jules Horne, has a background in music and literature, and started TextVizz to help teach people valuable writing skills, by highlighting grammar, structure, and vocabulary issues to improve communication skills.

Building a Tech Startup in the Scottish Borders

While the south of Scotland isn’t quite the ‘Silicon Lowlands’ yet, there’s certainly a lot of tech innovation in the region, and it’s only the beginning. 

“The barriers that used to exist to building a tech company in a rural region aren’t as prevalent now with changes to the ways of working,” said Sarah-Jane Burns, Techscaler’s head of regional engagement for the South of Scotland.

“There’s more opportunity to be able to build a business from a rural location, headquarter a business here, and also support other rural locations. What you get living somewhere here is a different quality of life to what you would in a city. You get to have everything you need, and still live in a nice place to raise a family.”

Starting a tech company in the south of Scotland may seem challenging, but these innovative firms show it’s more than possible. If you’re considering launching or relocating your business, the south offers huge potential—and plenty of space to grow.