London remains Europe's top tech hub after attracting record investment

London is keeping a tight hold of its crown as Europe's top tech city, despite Britain's Brexit vote.

Private equity investment in the capital's tech sector totalled £4.5bn ($5.8bn), said the Mayor of London's agency, London & Partners. This was the highest total for the last five years.

At the same time London's tech firms attracted £1.1bn of cash from venture capital outfits, who tend to invest in younger start-up firms. This total is more than in any other six-month period in the past decade, the agency said.

Investor appetite has been whetted by the number of mega deals tech firms based in the capital have commanded, such as the £388m bagged by Clerkenwell-based virtual reality start-up Improbable in May.

Improbable's chief executive, Herman Narula, said: "For a technology business looking to raise growth capital and scale, investment can come from anywhere in the world, but London is a great place to be located."

London & Partners chief executive Laura Citron said despite the Brexit vote the capital's "fundamental strengths" remained, such as access to finance, infrastructure, world-class universities and talent.

According to London & Partners, London's tech sector has attracted more venture capital investment than any other European city since the Brexit vote, including Dublin, Paris and Amsterdam.

It said the city had received £1.8bn in venture capital funding for 544 deals in the tech sector since the UK voted to leave the European Union on 23 June 2016.

During the same period, Berlin, the second largest city for venture capital tech investment, had received £775m for 136 deals.

Citron added: "The Brexit vote has understandably created some uncertainty but it is no surprise to see that London continues to attract more than double the amount of investment than any other European city."