New figures have recently revealed that women are making up an increasingly large proportion of the UK’s cadre of one-man (or one-woman in this case) businesses, largely thanks to an ability to identify emerging lifestyle trends.
New Research by Creditsafe, friend of Freelance Advisor and producers of our quite excellent credit control guide, has revealed that the number of start-up businesses has increased and will continue to accelerate by nearly 20% each year.
Late last year Prime Minister David Cameron announced his Government would be pumping £400 million into a project to create a Silicon Valley-style “Tech City” in the east end of London, specifically in the area surrounding the Old Street Roundabout.
There are any number of reasons a fledgling business can fail – and the sad truth is that the majority do within the first year. Be it financial mismanagement, lacklustre marketing or just poor products, the reasons for failure are almost as numerous as the failed businesses themselves. Now a study from the Startup Genome, a research group assembled to investigate what makes a successful business, has revealed that the top killer of startups is in fact premature scaling.
The annual Barclays Take One Small Step awards, which aims to identify and nurture outstanding new business ideas, saw over 5,000 entries this year, each showing innovation, diversity and creative flair.
HMRC staff are to begin calling new businesses to offer advice on how to correctly take care of their bookkeeping and tax obligations. HMRC is referring to this new practise as “telephone education”, and businesses will be contacted “at key stages in their lifecycles”.
Rachel Soothill | Getting a Job,News
The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills has revealed that the number of start-up businesses in the UK has increased by nearly 50,000 from 2009-2010. The government statistics show that there are now 4.5 million private sector firms operating in the UK, despite the difficult economic climate.
Around two weeks ago a cadre of UK entrepreneurs, with backing from some big corporate partners, launch the Start Up Britain campaign. The aim of the programme was to stir the UK’s entrepreneurial spirit and encourage more people to strike out on their own by offering what the organisers called a “£1,500 support package”.
In a huge country-by-country survey of economies around the globe, the UK has come 17th for the ease in which people can start up small businesses. That places us behind economic heavyweights such as the United States, Australia, Hong Kong and… Rwanda.
However, the UK does fare better when it comes to the ease of actually doing business, in which case, we finish 4th.
Late last week the Prime Minister in his human form gave a speech outlining the Government’s grand plans to invest heavily in the East of London in order to create a “world-leading technology city to rival Silicon Valley”.
Michael Rose | Getting a Job,News
Despite cuts across the board, overall, UK business is seeing a positive change thanks to the new Government. Tax breaks, including extended relief on the increase in Capital Gains Tax and National Insurance have been introduced and support for SMEs has been very positive.
To mark the importance of SMEs, The Startups Awards 2010 have added a Home Business of the Year category to their annual awards.
The top 5 home-business occupations in 2009 Whether it is a second income to make ends meet, a result of reduncancy or a decision to make a fresh start as a freelancer, the home business and startup sector looks like it will continue to grow in 2009. Freelance Advisor and home business startup supremo Emma [...]
