The Financial Conduct Authority, the UK’s financial services regulator, has welcomed five firms into its Scale-up Unit, offering tailored regulatory support to help them grow sustainably while managing rapid expansion.
ClearScore, Modulr, Teya, Urban Jungle and Zilch are the first cohort of firms regulated solely by the FCA to join the initiative, covering payments, consumer finance, credit information and insurance technology. Applications for solo-regulated firms opened in May 2026 and closed on 22 June 2026, with the next application window set to open soon.
The Scale-up Unit gives participating firms a dedicated point of contact to help them work through regulatory processes, respond to shifting policy, bring new products to market and engage with their sector as they expand. It sits alongside two other FCA programmes aimed at firms as they move from start-up to scale-up: Innovation Pathways and the Pre-Application Support Service, as well as the Early and High Growth Oversight function, which is designed to identify rapidly growing and newly authorised firms and engage with them proactively before they reach scale-up stage.
Between July 2025 and March 2026, the FCA ran an Early and High Growth Oversight pilot involving 15 firms across asset management, wealth management and payments, assessing whether their governance, risk management and control frameworks were keeping pace with their growth. Findings from that pilot, published on 10 August 2026, indicated that firms which invest early in governance and risk controls are better placed to handle the pressures of rapid growth and scale in a sustainable way.
The Scale-up Unit operates two separate tracks, with different eligibility criteria and application processes for dual-regulated firms, overseen jointly by the FCA and the Prudential Regulation Authority, and solo-regulated firms overseen by the FCA alone. A pilot cohort of six dual-regulated firms was announced in February 2026, and the regulator has said a second dual-regulated cohort will launch shortly.
Three of the newly announced firms, ClearScore, Modulr and Zilch, also belong to the Unicorn Council for UK FinTech, a group set up by Innovate Finance that brings together founders and chief executives of UK FinTech unicorns to support the sector’s growth. Since launching its innovation services, the FCA has now supported more than 1,000 innovative and growing firms.
FCA chief data, information and innovation officer Jessica Rusu said, “High-growth firms play a vital role in driving economic growth across the UK. We want the UK to remain one of the best places in the world to start, grow and scale a financial services business. That’s why we’re supporting ambitious firms as they scale, helping them navigate regulation and innovate with confidence.”
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