The government is often talking about how it wants to help small business: the good news is there are some very real and practical ways it is offering its support to SMEs. The demands of being a small business can be enormous. You will often find yourself involved with all aspects of your venture – to the most minute detail. This can be exciting whilst at the same time very demanding. No one said it would be easy to build up a business from scratch. After all you have so
Read more →
Venture Capital firms see a constant stream of start-ups telling them that they have developed a unique product that is going to disrupt their chosen market and deliver huge returns. To combat this, they will generally have developed a set of investment criteria that nine times out of ten will govern whether they decide to invest or not. To put it into context, a typical VC might review 2,000 or 3,000 plus ‘opportunities’ per annum and only invest in 10 or 15, while active angel investors might see 200-300 and invest in 4-5. The odds
Read more →
Crowdcube recently closed a £3.8 million Series B round and topped it up to £5M by raising £1.2M in just 16 minutes using its own crowdfunding platform, a new world record! Balderton Capital, which has previously backed fellow alternative finance platforms Zopa and Wonga, is leading the transaction and has installed one of their partners as a member of the Crowdcube board. The £5 million that raised has been earmarked for investment in UK and overseas expansion. Crowdcube has doubled its team to 50 and opened new satellite offices in London and Scotland alongside its headquarters
Read more →The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) is to regulate crowdfunding and peer-to-peer financing early next year. The FCA is the regulatory authority that oversees financial firms providing services to consumers and is the replacement body to the Financial Services Authority. The new regulator has published a consultation paper outlining its intended restrictions on traditional crowdfunding methods. It means products listed on crowdfunding websites may find it harder to source finance. Proposals include firms forced to disclose any potential risks and restricting sales to ‘sophisticated’ investors. It also intends on imposing restrictions
Read more →
Santander is trying to enter the rapidly growing lend to save market and team up with one of its biggest players, Funding Circle, some reports have claimed. The UK arm of the Spanish bank is in discussions with Funding Circle – which lends money from private investors direct to to small and medium-sized businesses – in a move which could undermine the sector’s position as an alternative to the big banks. According to the Financial Times, Funding Circle’s ability to tap into the balance sheet of one the UK’s biggest
Read more →We all have great ideas from time to time. The difference is that some of us know what to do in order to take it into the next level and some of us don’t. The good news is that help is now at hand if financing is the only problem that is holding you back. Crowdfunding is a fantastic way of turning your bright ideas into something real, and here are some ideas on how you can do this successfully. 1. Don’t Look for Sympathy You want to get hold
Read more →
Banks have been accused of deliberately making it difficult for small businesses to borrow via crowdfunding sites by delaying paperwork and charging high fees. Crowdfunding sites like Funding Circle, which has arranged more than £100million of lending to firms, said that it is dealing with several cases of firms forced to wait months to receive funding because of hold-ups by high street banks. The problems arise because most loans arranged through crowdfunding sites require a charge over the firms assets in the event that the firm defaults on the loan.
Read more →
Crowdcube has raised £1.5 million through what it describers as a new world record for funds raised via an equity crowdfunding platform. Founded in February 2011, Crowdcube allows businesses to showcase themselves and secure growth capital from a large group of investors. Crowdcube says it first set out to raise £250,000 but, having raised that within the first five hours, made it live for a further three days to raise the rest of the amount. In total, 259 investors contributed to the round. When Crowdcube last tried to raise capital through
Read more → Phone: 0203 397 0491
Fax: 0203 397 2427
