Family Business Scale-ups: Breaking Barriers to Growth
Foreword
Executive summary
FURTHER BUSINESS SUPPORT •
• While five in ten are confident that the activities under way to bridge the growth capital gap by unlocking pension funds and institutional monies, such as the Mansion House Accord, new National Wealth Fund and British Growth Partnership Fund, will reach them, more than a third would consider a stock exchange listing, with the UK being the most likely destination. • Around half of mid-market and scaling family businesses are aware of the latest government strategies that are being developed, and seven in ten feel that these strategies will be beneficial to their business. • In building sustainable businesses for the long term, family firms continue to voice concern over the changes in the tax system and the need for stability. FBUK’s Policy Agenda found that business rates and corporation tax are having the biggest impact on mid-market family businesses and there is also concern about Employer National Insurance Contributions. 4 They desire a review of Inheritance Taxes (Business Property Relief and Agricultural Property Relief), as also reflected by family businesses such as JW Lees and Bettys & Taylors – which is discussed in the Case Studies section later in this publication. • Vital for their confidence in future growth is the need for more joined-up, stable and predictable tax and regulatory frameworks, which support long- term investment, succession and innovation.
While family businesses are positive about the government’s Industrial and Trade Strategies and Plan for Small Businesses, in implementing these they want to have better strategic account management of family firms in their local communities and clusters. • Where concierge services are being considered, they would value fast-tracking of innovation opportunities and collaborations; support for going into new markets overseas; and sharing and fast-tracking of procurement opportunities. • Eight in ten family firms say that they are using some form of external finance, which in the main is debt, with three in ten family businesses utilising some form of external equity funding, which they require to be patient. In common with others, however, when seeking funding, they view it as harder to raise outside London. They also highlight challenges to do with the scale of funds people are willing to invest, the appetite for risk of UK funders, and the level of short-termism in their outlook, meaning they are less willing to invest for a longer period and to provide patient capital at scale. • To overcome these challenges they would like more regular set briefings with the investor community on investor options and trends; “meet the investor” events to showcase their businesses; access to investor relationship managers/advisors; and also the ability to find relevant finance board advisors and NEDs. • Positively, six in ten think that public-sector finance offerings are joined up and a similar proportion are aware of recent changes made in the capital markets, including the Private Intermittent Securities and Capital Exchange System (PISCES) and listing reforms.
4 https://familybusinessuk.org/family-first-approach-in-new-fbuk-policy-agenda/
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