Birmingham tops entrepreneurial league table, again
More companies were started in Birmingham last year than in any other UK city outside of London.
The latest figures show that 14,152 small firms were registered, meaning that Birmingham retains its title of Britain’s most entrepreneurial regional city for the second year running.
However, the total has dipped by more than 4,000 from the 18,337 companies registered in 2014.
, do not indicate how many of the new companies are still surviving after a year or two years, or how many people they employ.
Birmingham’s record of 14,152 new companies is substantially higher than the next nearest rival, Manchester, which saw 8,712 companies registered.
Neighbours Solihull managed 1,566 start-ups, while Coventry registered 3,325.
London outstrips all of the regional cities added together, with 196,146 companies registered in 2015.
Sue Summers, Chief Executive of Finance Birmingham, said:
Although Birmingham recorded fewer new company registrations than in 2014, it remains a highly popular location for start-ups and entrepreneurs.
The city offers a large, skilled and youthful workforce, established infrastructure and strong digital connectivity – all of which are critical to helping new ideas and ambitions flourish, particularly in the creative and tech sectors.
The ability to provide a range of flexible funding opportunities to SMEs underpins a healthy business environment for entrepreneurs. Finance Birmingham recently started working with Ascension Ventures, which provides equity investments to early-stage digital media and tech firms, to ensure that local firms in these industries are supported as much as possible.
The development and extension of more national and regional funding programmes, so they can be offered to a greater number of new businesses, will help Birmingham to further establish its reputation as a national start-up hub.”
Ian Mclaughlan, Manager of the Greater Birmingham & Solihull Growth Hub, commented:
It’s very positive news that Birmingham remains a hotspot for entrepreneurship, recording more new business registrations than any other UK regional city in 2015. It’s clear that there are significant numbers of aspiring business owners in Greater Birmingham – at the Growth Hub, we are dealing with them every day and have so far received over 1,000 enquiries from across the region, with more people asking about setting up a company than any other topic.
However a fall in company registrations in Birmingham, compared with 2014, demonstrates that the region must continue to provide a comprehensive network of support for new businesses. We need to be flexible enough to recognise the potential in a company, even if it hasn’t fully started operations.
The majority of enquiries to the Hub are about access to finance, which remains a critical factor in ensuring that companies can have the best possible start – and realise their full potential long-term.
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