Barclays Supports Global Entrepreneurship Week

Today marks the start of Global Entrepreneurship Week (GEW). At Barclays we are committed to helping support UK scale-ups and their founders, supporting them to grow and in turn help create thousands of new jobs for the UK economy.

Our global banking model provides the ideal platform to support customers and clients, seamlessly, at whatever stage they come to us - from helping to nurture start-ups through to providing capital markets support as these businesses reach scale. This is a key part of both our company and citizenship agendas; to help establish a long-term pipeline of high-growth businesses, driving job creation and economic growth at a local and national level.

To help support this growing sector, Barclays has launched a dedicated proposition, ‘Barclays High Growth and Entrepreneurs’. This commitment brings together a dedicated team of 50 Barclays High-Growth and Entrepreneur Relationship Directors from across the UK to support high-growth companies from start-ups, to scale up to IPO. This team is in addition to the thousands of SME, Corporate Banking and Wealth managers across the country, who will also actively seek out and refer entrepreneurs for specialist support. A further 13 specialist High-Growth Credit Sanctioners will support the lending needs of high-growth businesses.

In addition, Barclays has also established two new dedicated funds totalling £150m to specifically help innovative companies under Barclays’ High-Growth Venture Debt Fund and Innovation Finance. Thirteen Venture Debt transactions have been completed to date. These funds ensure that fast-growing firms in the UK do not miss out in comparison to US counterparts.

This year’s GEW launch event is taking place in our Manchester ‘Rise’.  Rise is a network of physical spaces and virtual communities designed to work with innovative start-ups to pioneer the future of financial technology. Barclays currently has Rise hubs in London, Manchester and New York, with sites in Cape Town and Tel Aviv opening soon.  Rise is also home to the Barclays Accelerator, a start-up programme for fintech businesses in conjunction with Techstars, which has already supported several companies in driving innovation in financial services.

Our sponsorship of GEW is in its fourth year and is part of our broader commitment to the sector. Throughout the week we will be holding events and panel discussions across the country with speakers including Anna Soubry, MP Business Innovation and Skills, Piers Linney from Dragons' Den and CEO of Outsourcery, and Michael Hartig, Head of the North West region for Barclays.

For more information on the support Barclays' High Growth and Entrepreneurs team can offer you, please contact Richard Heggie, Barclays’ Head of High Growth and Entrepreneurs.

Find out more detail on this year’s GEW activityThis year’s GEW activity (new window) Contact us for more information on Barclays' High Growth and Entrepreneurs teamEmail Richard Heggie (new window) Find out more about Barclays AcceleratorBarclays Accelerator (new window)