Shaires Holdings (AIM: SHR) has joined the London market with a simple idea: give stock market investors access to some of the private companies driving the growth of artificial intelligence.

CEO Vivek ‘Vick’ Seth talks through the thinking behind Shaires, its investment strategy and why the company believes this is an interesting point in the development of AI.

The portfolio is deliberately concentrated and focused on established private technology businesses rather than very early-stage ventures. Current investments include Anthropic, Stripe, Colossal Biosciences, SandboxAQ and Figure AI, with Shaires looking to add further companies as it puts new capital to work.

A big part of the argument is that investors are increasingly having to wait longer to access successful technology businesses. Companies are staying private for longer, meaning substantial growth and increases in valuation can happen before they ever reach the stock market.

Seth discusses where he sees the next opportunities within AI, from the infrastructure supporting the technology through to increasingly specialised applications, and why he believes the current wave still has a long way to run.

We also discuss why Shaires decided to list in London, why AIM was chosen, how the company intends to approach new investments and what opening up this part of the private market could mean for retail investors.