A Guide through London

Introduction:

The entrepreneurial ventures usher a lot of benefits to the market. Entrepreneurial ventures lead to generation of new employment opportunities in the market besides leading to new product development. They also increase the revenue generation in a country and encourages economic development. The governments of different countries to reap these benefits of entrepreneurial ventures, provides them with financial support. The paper would present an entrepreneurial guide to entrepreneurs who look forward to enter Birmingham in West Midlands, the United Kingdom. The guide would point out the facilities which Birmingham can offer the business ventures to encourage their growth.

Entrepreneurship:

Entrepreneurship refers to the process and starting of new business ventures in order to earn profits. One can point out that as far as business contexts are concerned, entrepreneurial startup businesses create new opportunities in the market. The entrepreneurs recognize new business opportunities and business requirements in the market. They use the opportunities to start new businesses by acquiring raw materials and human resources. Thus, in this context in can be said that entrepreneurial ventures create new employment opportunities (Burns et al., 2016). The entrepreneurs have the propensity to take risks which they encounter during the course of establishing the businesses. One of the risks they face is limitation of available financial resources which in fact limit their capability of acquiring human resources and materials context and relevant concepts. However, start-up entrepreneurial ventures play a great role in creating employment opportunities, revenue generation and economic development in the economies. One can also note that some of the leading companies in the world like Google started their journey as entrepreneurial start-ups. The entrepreneurs recognize new needs in the market which the present goods cannot fulfill. They use these gaps as opportunities to bring about new product developments. There are several factors which factor development of entrepreneurial ventures like availability of finance and availability of markets. The markets provide opportunities to entrepreneurs sell their products which may be services or goods to earn revenue (Bridoux and Stoelhorst 2014). The developed and emerging economies in the world provide these opportunities to start-up entrepreneurial ventures which has led to emergence of more of these ventures compared to poor economies. These emerging ventures in the developed and developing markets have boosted their economic growth whereas dearth of such ventures has limited the growth of underdeveloped markets. One such market which favours start-ups is Birmingham, West Midlands in the United Kingdom (Toma et al. 2014).

The start-up scenario in Birmingham:

Figure 1. Statistics hsowing sucess rate of Startups in Birmingham compared to the UK

(Source: data.london.gov.uk 2018)

Figure 2. Statistics showing death rate of Start-ups in Birmingham compared to the UK

(Source: data.london.gov.uk 2018)

The two figures shown above compare between the emergence of new start-up businesses and death of start-up businesses. The statistics above shows that as far as emergence of entrepreneurial ventures are concerned, Birmingham shows higher percentage to the United Kingdom compared to London. London shows 1 percent increase in the start-ups and remains uniform throughout the 2010 to 2016. Birmingham, in comparison to London shows increase in the number of entrepreneurial ventures after statics increase in 2014. The city in West Midlands shows a steady increase to 8 percent in 2015 and 2016. Similarly, as far as the death of enterprises are concerned, West Midlands shows a fall from 8 percent to 7 percent in 2016. London in comparison to West Midlands has shown an increase by a percent in death rate of entrepreneurial ventures. This analysis shows that among West Midlands has emerged into a more friendly location for entrepreneurial ventures.

Benefactors of entrepreneurial guide provided:

The entrepreneurial guide of Birmingham would prove beneficial to a large number of stakeholder groups. The first group which would benefit from the guide would be entrepreneurial firms which seek to enter the United Kingdom, especially Birmingham. They information about sources of finance mentioned in the guide would help them to choose the most appropriate sources of finance to fund their venture. The entrepreneurs which are finding it difficult to establish their ventures in London and are looking for a comparatively less competitive market would find the guide about Birmingham extremely helpful (Tantalo and Priem 2016).

The second group of stakeholders who would benefit indirectly from the guide consist of local government bodies in Birmingham. This is because entry of new entrepreneurial firms in the market of Birmingham would mean new sources of taxes for them. Moreover, new entrepreneurial ventures create new job opportunities which would raise the employment rate in the city (Spence 2016).

The third group of stakeholders which would benefit by opening of new entrepreneurial businesses in Birmingham would be the financial institutions: This is because entry of new firms would means new business opportunities for these financial institutions to sell their loan products. This would generate additional business opportunities for them (Zahra and Wright 2016).

The fourth group of stakeholders who would profit by the entry of the new entrepreneurial business organisations would be customers. The customers would be able to consume new products which would be able to meet their new requirements. This analysis shows that though entrepreneurs are directly benefitted by entrepreneurial guides, the other groups of stakeholders benefit from these guides as well (De Massis et al. 2014).

Support opportunities and networks available in Birmingham:

The economy of the United Kingdom is experiencing a boom in the entrepreneurial ventures especially in the cities like Birmingham, in West Midlands. Birmingham compared to London has more number of start-up companies. This is because London being the capital of the United Kingdom and one of the international financial hubs in the world has large number of established companies. These established companies give stiff competition to the small newly established companies which ultimately die out (ft.com 2018). This is evident from the high rate of company deaths in London. Birmingham, the financial hub of West Midlands compared to London has experienced slower but more sustainable growth of start-ups. This is because the growth of start-up companies has given boost to the economy of Birmingham.

The second factor which Birmingham experienced is increase in the retail sector. For example, after London, Birmingham is the most sought after retail destinations in the United Kingdom. The city has experienced considerable development in sectors like manufacturing, financial services and business services. This factor has boosted the entrepreneurial ventures in these sectors as well as the retail sector (Naudé 2014).

The third factor which has boosted the growth of industries in Birmingham is availability of networks. The city in West Midlands is the second most sought after cities in the United Kingdom after London and as a result is served by a strong network of transport. The city of Birmingham is connected to London and the other parts of the United Kingdom through railways. The Birmingham International Airport allows transportation to and from international destinations. Efficient transportation network has enabled transportation of raw materials and people. Thus start-up firms would be able to to utilise the transport network of Birmingham to transport resources and also distribute finished products (Liñán and Fernandez-Serrano 2014).

The fourth factor which start-up firms can take advantage of in Birmingham is rich network of financial institutions. The Government of the United Kingdom provides financial assistance to small and medium business start-ups. The government provides economic help to business organisations on regional basis. The Government of the United Kingdom has launched the BCRS loans for West Midlands including Birmingham. The entrepreneurial ventures can get financial assistance of GBP 10000 to 150000 as per their needs. The repayment period would one to seven years and these organisations should have maximum 250 employees. However, these business organisations should be able to prove their inability of getting loans from banks (gov.uk 2018).

The entrepreneurship business organisations in the United Kingdom can take advantage of the business incubators. These are established firms which offer support to start-up firms like offering training to their staff members, thus strengthening the human resource of the latter.

Entrepreneurs seeking to enter the market of Birmingham can also take help of the regional growth funds which are sponsored by regional companies. The entrepreneurs can also approach the government for start-up loans. The government also provides services like mentoring and support for the start-ups. However, the entrepreneurs seeking government loan should apply for the same at least a year ahead (Audretsch, Belitski and Desai 2015).

Case study example:

Birmingham is emerging as one of the top start-up business hubs not only in the United Kingdom but in fact in entire Europe. The business analytics have already started holding the city ahead of London in terms of commercial importance. The cost of living in Lonodn is very high compared to the other parts of the UK whereas Birmingham is still affordable. The city as already exemplified above is served by air, land and road transport and is well connected to London. This means that the people living in the city can travel to and from London easily. This is attracting more people to Birmingham and with them the infrastructure building companies. Multinational banks like the HSBC Bank are opening strategic branches in the city to exploit its growing market. These availability of large consumer population, financial institutions and favourable infrastructure like transport in Birmingham is encourage more start-ups compared to other cities in the UK including London, the capital city (ft.com 2018).

Conclusion:

  The above discussion clearly shows that entrepreneurial ventures bear several good outcomes for the economies. The governments and the business organisations in every economy should provide entrepreneurial ventures with financial support to encourage their growth. Birmingham would provide a great entrepreneurial opportunity for the entrepreneurs. They must explore the market to develop their business ventures. They must follow entrepreneurial guides to gain information regarding crucial areas like sources of finance, availability of raw materials and competitors. They must also gain information about the macro economic factors prevailing in Britain before making decisions to enter the market.

References:

Audretsch, D.B., Belitski, M. and Desai, S., 2015. Entrepreneurship and economic development in cities. The Annals of Regional Science, 55(1), pp.33-60.

BCRS Business Loans – West Midlands. 2018. GOV.UK. Retrieved 28 April 2018, from https://www.gov.uk/business-finance-support/bcrs-business-loans-west-midlands

Bridoux, F. and Stoelhorst, J.W., 2014. Microfoundations for stakeholder theory: Managing stakeholders with heterogeneous motives. Strategic Management Journal, 35(1), pp.107-125.

Burns, B.L., Barney, J.B., Angus, R.W. and Herrick, H.N., 2016. Enrolling stakeholders under conditions of risk and uncertainty. Strategic Entrepreneurship Journal, 10(1), pp.97-106.

Data.london.gov.uk. 2018. London Datastore. [online] Available at: https://data.london.gov.uk/dataset/business-demographics-and-survival-rates-borough [Accessed 28 Apr. 2018].

De Massis, A., Kotlar, J., Chua, J.H. and Chrisman, J.J., 2014. Ability and willingness as sufficiency conditions for family‐oriented particularistic behavior: implications for theory and empirical studies. Journal of Small Business Management, 52(2), pp.344-364.

Ft.com. 2018. London start-ups are most likely to fail. [online] Available at: https://www.ft.com/content/e3c745c4-88d8-11e7-afd2-74b8ecd34d3b [Accessed 28 Apr. 2018].

Ft.com. 2018. Why Birmingham is now one of Europe’s best cities for investors. [online] Available at: https://www.ft.com/content/26c293dc-fe12-11e4-8efb-00144feabdc0 [Accessed 30 Apr. 2018].

Gast, J., Gundolf, K. and Cesinger, B., 2017. Doing business in a green way: A systematic review of the ecological sustainability entrepreneurship literature and future research directions. Journal of Cleaner Production, 147, pp.44-56.

Liñán, F. and Fernandez-Serrano, J., 2014. National culture, entrepreneurship and economic development: different patterns across the European Union. Small Business Economics, 42(4), pp.685-701.

Naudé, W., 2014. Entrepreneurship and economic development. International Development. Ideas, Experiences and Prospects.

Salamzadeh, A. and Kawamorita Kesim, H., 2015. Startup Companies: Life Cycle and Challenges.

Smallbone, D., Welter, F. and Ateljevic, J., 2014. Entrepreneurship in emerging market economies: Contemporary issues and perspectives. International Small Business Journal, 32(2), pp.113-116.

Spence, L.J., 2016. Small business social responsibility: Expanding core CSR theory. Business & Society, 55(1), pp.23-55.

Tantalo, C. and Priem, R.L., 2016. Value creation through stakeholder synergy. Strategic Management Journal, 37(2), pp.314-329.

Toma, S.G., Grigore, A.M. and Marinescu, P., 2014. Economic development and entrepreneurship. Procedia Economics and Finance, 8, pp.436-443.

Zahra, S.A. and Wright, M., 2016. Understanding the social role of entrepreneurship. Journal of Management Studies, 53(4), pp.610-629.