Festival of Business to promote SME growth
HIGH profile speakers including former Tesco supremo Sir Terry Leahy, and Goldman Sachs’ star economist Jim O’Neill will be sharing tip for success stage this week at a major business event.
Other speakers at The Daily Telegraph’s Festival of Business include new BIS minister Michael Fallon, Martha Lane Fox – the first generation dot-com entrepreneur and Herwig Vennekens, UK managing director of German sweet giant Haribo.
The free event, at Manchester Central on Friday, is aimed at inspiring the directors of small and medium sized business.
Damian Reece, head of business at The Daily Telegraph told TheBusinessDesk.com he is “delighted” to be bringing the event to his native North West for a second year.
The respected 45-year-old Boltonian said:”We are determined to repeat the success of last year. Manchester is a great city and we wanted to hold this national event there to reflect the fact that the UK economy is not just about London and the South East.”
Mr Reece, who was born in Horwich near Bolton and attended the University of Manchester, said the 700 attendees could look forward to hearing from a “very exciting group of business leaders.”
“The session with Sir Terry Leahy will feature three key areas: the lessons learned during his time at Tesco; what he has experienced as investor in SMEs (Sir Terry’s portfolio includes e-tailer The Hut Group); and finally his thoughts on some of the policy issues on growth.
“Jim O’Neill is always brilliant and he is worth coming to hear just on his own, while I’ll be asking Herwig Vennekens about the German economy and about how medium-sized companies there have become the backbone of Germany.”
The event also features practical break-out sessions on funding, trading online and exports. With manufacturing in mind a panel debate includes Alex Burns, head of the Williams F1 team and Mark Barclay of Airbus.
Online giant Google is also staging a 90-minute ‘teach-in’ on using the web to grow your business.
To register for the Festival of Business go to telegraph.co.uk/festivalofbusiness
