Decades of neglect, underfunding, and the pursuit of short-term gains by successive governments have stunted development and eroded business confidence.
I have worked for most of my life for US technology startups opening for business in EMEA. I have had several attempts at creating my own businesses along along the say, a successful Microsoft Gold partner with a friend, selling primarily to the FTSE 100. A software company that was designed to inject relevant advertising into applications (two years before Apple, Yahoo, Google, Microsoft spent about $6bn on acquisitions in that space), I'm actually glad I didn't do that one as I would be very much hated by users everywhere, anyway to my point... the Banks are NOT helpful to SMBs, and UK venture capitalists do not understand the meaning of the word venture. At another stsrtup, working out of the Plug-and-play tech centre on Wolf Creek in San Jose, we had lunch time 10 minute pitches to VCs pretty much every day of the week. The equivalent of a Regus office with full service hosting, and services to help you succeed at a new company. You could call it an incubator I suppose. Never seen anything like it in the UK, A & B rounds, access to great potential board members, and help IPOing or exiting via a sale. Okay so its a particular industry but honestly until the UKs VCs stop being sure-bet capitalists and Banks start helping businesses reach the next stage and don't just arbitrarily remove over drafts, nothing much will change.
I think we need to determine which industries the UK has a chance at leading the world in, and focus heavily on doing whatever it takes to enhance development in those industries. The US is very good at incentivising growth both via public sector initiatives and in the private sector due to the continuous performance of their equity market, which is the end-goal for most private companies. A good start would be to make the UK an enviable place to list public companies, as a strong equity market will act as a catalyst for more private investment in future publicly-listed companies. Furthermore, government policy needs to support new businesses, especially in high-growth / high-importance sectors, when private funding hasn't yet addressed the industry's needs.
Forgot to add, low interest rates allowed companies to buy back their own stock to inflate their value while saddling them with debt mountains. That should never have been allowed to happen, also, infinity credit created in the finance market has destroyed everything. What? Well when Hedge funds buy huge amounts of residential real estate with leveraged debt that's carved up and sold to pensions you know were being screwed over. Its distorting everything and needs reigning in imho
Do you agree with Angus Hanton's position on takeover of British companies by US major corporations and private equities, often with headquarters moving outside the country? Also the transition from highstreets to online has followed a trend of losing revenue to US based e-commerce. Should these issues be factored into the analysis?
Yes, UK equity markets have absolutely become a target for global takeovers, I cover this more in-depth in my article on the UK benefiting from US tariffs, which you may find interesting. There is certainly a trend of high-street activity declining as online increases, and the US will be beneficiaries, alongside Chinese retailers. However, I think the crux of my argument is that despite the high-streets declining, which will be extremely difficult to reverse, there are growing numbers of extractive high-street entities which are doing more damage than good, and these need to be addressed in the short-term, if the wider high-street decline becomes inevitable.
I have worked for most of my life for US technology startups opening for business in EMEA. I have had several attempts at creating my own businesses along along the say, a successful Microsoft Gold partner with a friend, selling primarily to the FTSE 100. A software company that was designed to inject relevant advertising into applications (two years before Apple, Yahoo, Google, Microsoft spent about $6bn on acquisitions in that space), I'm actually glad I didn't do that one as I would be very much hated by users everywhere, anyway to my point... the Banks are NOT helpful to SMBs, and UK venture capitalists do not understand the meaning of the word venture. At another stsrtup, working out of the Plug-and-play tech centre on Wolf Creek in San Jose, we had lunch time 10 minute pitches to VCs pretty much every day of the week. The equivalent of a Regus office with full service hosting, and services to help you succeed at a new company. You could call it an incubator I suppose. Never seen anything like it in the UK, A & B rounds, access to great potential board members, and help IPOing or exiting via a sale. Okay so its a particular industry but honestly until the UKs VCs stop being sure-bet capitalists and Banks start helping businesses reach the next stage and don't just arbitrarily remove over drafts, nothing much will change.
I think we need to determine which industries the UK has a chance at leading the world in, and focus heavily on doing whatever it takes to enhance development in those industries. The US is very good at incentivising growth both via public sector initiatives and in the private sector due to the continuous performance of their equity market, which is the end-goal for most private companies. A good start would be to make the UK an enviable place to list public companies, as a strong equity market will act as a catalyst for more private investment in future publicly-listed companies. Furthermore, government policy needs to support new businesses, especially in high-growth / high-importance sectors, when private funding hasn't yet addressed the industry's needs.
Forgot to add, low interest rates allowed companies to buy back their own stock to inflate their value while saddling them with debt mountains. That should never have been allowed to happen, also, infinity credit created in the finance market has destroyed everything. What? Well when Hedge funds buy huge amounts of residential real estate with leveraged debt that's carved up and sold to pensions you know were being screwed over. Its distorting everything and needs reigning in imho
An interesting article, glad I found you on X
Thank you very much for reading, it’s greatly appreciated!
Do you agree with Angus Hanton's position on takeover of British companies by US major corporations and private equities, often with headquarters moving outside the country? Also the transition from highstreets to online has followed a trend of losing revenue to US based e-commerce. Should these issues be factored into the analysis?
Yes, UK equity markets have absolutely become a target for global takeovers, I cover this more in-depth in my article on the UK benefiting from US tariffs, which you may find interesting. There is certainly a trend of high-street activity declining as online increases, and the US will be beneficiaries, alongside Chinese retailers. However, I think the crux of my argument is that despite the high-streets declining, which will be extremely difficult to reverse, there are growing numbers of extractive high-street entities which are doing more damage than good, and these need to be addressed in the short-term, if the wider high-street decline becomes inevitable.
So many good points and all spot on.