More start ups in Birmingham than any other provincial city – survey
BIRMINGHAM has been revealed as the most entrepreneurial city in the UK outside of London.
The Start up Britain survey, revealed in yesterday’s Sunday Times newspaper, showed that the city is a start up hotspot with more new businesses formed in Birmingham than anywhere else outside the capital.
Start up Britain drew on last year’s Companies House data to assess where new companies were started across the UK. Birmingham led the table outside of London with 16,281 companies registered. This compared to Manchester, in second place, which saw 4,515 less businesses being trading with 11,765 start ups and Glasgow, which saw 8,085 new companies launch in the city.
And there is further good news for the region as Coventry made the top ten list at number ten with 6,446 start ups.
Neil Rami, chief executive of Marketing Birmingham, which operates Business Birmingham, the inward investment agency for the area, said: “Birmingham’s start up success is not accidental. It is our innovative talent, ‘can do’ mentality, tailored support schemes and the fervent backing of our local business community, which combined with our proximity to the capital and affordability, makes Birmingham a start up hotspot.
“There is a real buzz about the city and the businesses that are calling it home at the moment.”
Lucan Gray, owner of The Custard Factory and Fazeley Studios, which houses a cluster of the city’s creative and digital businesses in the city’s Digbeth area, said: “We have seen a huge uplift in start up activity in recent months, evident in enquiries across both the Custard Factory and Fazeley Studios.
“Birmingham offers start ups a strong talent pool and peer network, support schemes, flexible working spaces, affordability and easy access to the capital.
The latest Cities Outlook report from Centre for Cities, released today, appears to back these findings by showing a marked increase in private sector job creation in Birmingham since 2010.
Birmingham ranks third behind London and Edinburgh with 15,400 jobs created over the period.
However, the report also suggests the economic gap between London and the rest of the UK is widening because other cities are “punching below their weight” and said there is a brain drain of talent heading from the regions to London.
London has created ten times more private sector jobs than any other city since 2010, analysis by the Centre for Cities found.
Its research found almost a third of people aged between 22 and 30 who moved cities headed for London.
The think tank is calling for more power to be devolved to the regions.
