StartUp Britain, the roadshow for entrepreneurs, kicks off in Bristol on Monday with the city’s SETsquared business acceleration unit playing a key role.
SETsquared, an enterprise collaboration between five universities including Bristol, will provide expert business mentoring support for the Bristol leg of StartUp Britain’s summer bus tour.
StartUp Britain will visit 14 entrepreneurial hot spots across the UK in a bid to celebrate, inspire and accelerate the nation’s start-up talent and encourage more people to start and grow their own business
The first stop will be Paintworks, Bristol creative industry quarter, on Bath Road, where from 9am to 11.30am budding Bristol entrepreneurs and small business owners will hear from business leaders, experts, entrepreneurs and small business writers offering business advice, speed mentoring and speed networking.
SETsquared Bristol centre director Nick Sturge said: “It’s great that this tour kicks off in Bristol, one of the leading locations for technology companies in the UK. We are delighted to be offering expert mentoring support to Bristol’s up and coming talent.”
StartUp Britain co-founder and interim chief executive Emma Jones added: “We will be meeting students and helping them turn ideas into ventures and we’ll be visiting employees moving from employment into self-employment. I look forward to welcoming hundreds of start-ups and small businesses on board.”
SETsquared supports new businesses – both university spin-outs and from the wider community. Through its business incubation and acceleration centres, entrepreneurs can tap into services and accelerate the growth of their businesses. It has an excellent pedigree in providing support for hi-tech, high-growth startups and step-up businesses and 88% of its incubated companies are still in business three years on.
At the Bristol centre alone, SETsquared has helped its members raise of more than £53m investment funds in the last four years.
