£150m Northern Scale-Up Fund: Can the North East Get Its Share?
The British Business Bank will invest £5m to £15m at a time, but only five North East digital firms raised that much in the past year.
- The fund will make investments of £5m to £15m in fast-growing Northern firms.
- Of 40 Northern digital-tech firms that raised £5m or more in a year, five were in the North East.
- The North West accounted for 24 and Yorkshire and the Humber for 10.
The government has announced a new £150m fund for the North’s fastest-growing businesses, with the British Business Bank set to make investments of between £5m and £15m.
The package also includes a new Northern 500 network and closer links between mayoral authorities and the National Wealth Fund.
Where the North East starts from
Later-stage capital has long been hard to find outside London, so cheques of this size could be significant. But the North East is not starting from the same place as the rest of the North.
Analysis of Beauhurst data by Newcastle Tech Digest editor Jamie Hardesty found that almost 400 Northern digital-tech companies raised investment in the past 12 months. Only 40 raised £5m or more, and just five of those were based in the North East, compared with 24 in the North West and 10 in Yorkshire and the Humber.
That puts the North East at around 13% of the Northern total, against 62% for the North West.
What it means for founders
For North East firms to win a meaningful share of the fund, the region will need to identify which companies could realistically grow into £5m to £15m candidates, and help more of them become investable at that level.
