Features / Start-ups
Incubation inspiration
Depending on which research you read, anywhere between 50 and 90 per cent of start-ups fail. Deflating figures for wannabe entrepreneurs.
Thankfully there are strategies for playing the odds down, one of which is business incubation. Business incubators are organisations that help fledgling companies survive the difficult early stages of business by providing a flexible combination of infrastructure, business development support and commercial expertise.
Funded by government and regional development organisations they’re seen as a means of positively evolving a city’s economy at a grass roots level, nurturing new enterprise from home and abroad. Being forward thinking, Bristol is well furnished with business incubators.
“Statistically, a new business supported in an incubator environment has around an 85 per cent survival rate compared with only 44 per cent if they go it alone,” says Jane McFarlane at Spike Design, one of Bristol’s creative accelerators from which concepts such as the Affordable Art Fair sprung since it launched eight years ago.
“In particular creative businesses need that collaborative working environment, where they can knowledge share and access professional business advice. Spike Design was initially launched with Regional Development Agency Funding to provide a supportive and collaborative environment for the large number of creative micro businesses in Bristol. The supportive nature of a space acts as a catalyst for inspiration and ideas, driving forward their creative output.”
It’s not just about getting bedroom entrepreneurs out of the house and into grown-up offices.
“We’re an accelerator for ideas,” emphasises Verity McIntosh of the Watershed’s Pervasive Media Studio, “not just office space.
“We created a co-location space before they were really a thing and encourage a culture of being curious and interruptible. If we curate difference into the mix and encourage people to cross-pollinate, everyone’s ideas will improve, so we don’t discriminate between cultural and commercial projects” – one reason that Pervasive Media Studios has brought to life ideas as diverse as zombie chase games, playable lampposts and photo sharing apps. “The studio is good for concepts that don’t yet have a market yet.”
However for the importance of variety, incubators tend to have an industry theme. Housed in one of Brunel’s old train sheds, the Engine Shed brings together two tech incubators under one roof – SETsquared and Webstart. SETsquared launched in 2002 “to bring expertise in high-tech business to early stage start-ups” and currently has 66 member businesses – 90 per cent B2B – of which 16 are resident. Companies in incubators tend to be resident for anywhere between a few months to a few years before flying the nest.
“It has been very successful,” says Nick Sturge, the centre’s director; “we have been ranked best in Europe, and, in Bristol, over the last 7 years, only 2 per cent of the companies we have supported have gone bust.” Wriggle and Tidal Generation are just two of the leading lights to have benefitted from the support.
“Business incubators are not for everyone, and there are different types of accelerator for different types, sector and stage of business,” warns Nick, but “generally they can add immense value to the success rate and time to market and profit. Importantly, they also act as connectors of companies to professional services, investors and customers; as well as generally enhancing the networks that exist.”
For Bristol as a city it adds vibrancy and sends a powerful message to onlookers that the region is a great place to start or grow a business.