The Incubator & Accelerator Map UK

MapAid wants to support and boost local and regional economies in the UK.

With unemployment and redundancies on the rise, as the Covid-19 pandemic ravishes through the economy, there are indications of a significant rise in start-ups during the coronavirus lockdown.

Well before the pandemic, one of our team at MapAid conducted an international post-graduate study of the factors that help small new businesses to start and survive. They did this in association with Henley Business School which is part of Reading University UK, who scrutinised and validated the work.

One of the central conclusions arrived at was the vital importance of small business mentoring, as part of a package of survival benefits, to enable a small business to launch, adapt, overcome, and then break-even.

What is mentoring ? In sum, most of the time it consists of sitting down regularly with a cup of tea, and chatting with a more experienced business person, and together working out the priorities for what needs doing and by when, while avoiding the glaring mistakes they made !

While many start-ups grow and experience success, the fact remains just less than half of small business start-ups survive more than five years.

(Source: ONS click here)

However, there is growing evidence, that connecting a small start-up business, even consisting of just one person, with a mentor, can significantly improve upon this statistic. Several sources confirm the importance of mentors, one of them being the global shipping & logistics firm UPS. They state, from research, that 70 percent of small business owners that receive mentoring survive for five years or more, double the rate of those who do not receive mentoring.

(Source: Small-business-mentoring-month-2014 click here)

Mentoring that occurs within the context of a ‘business start-up incubator’, or an incubator that accelerates an existing business, known simply an ‘accelerator’, may in parallel add additional benefits of other vital job solutions, such as funding or training, which may dramatically combine to support the power of mentoring.

This is why we have made our Incubator & Accelerator Map UK, that we proudly share with you here. We also have plans to extend this work to create national maps in the USA, Nepal, and other countries across the world.

We would love you to voluntarily subscribe to the map to help us, and yourself.

Why ?

When you subscribe it means we can track your movements, and improve our offering to a wider audience, including you – and especially if you need to find an incubator or some mentoring. But it goes deeper, we want these maps to benefit the policy makers and agencies behind the mentors and the incubators or accelerators, so they can see where more could happen, including places where it is needed most !

More about Mentoring

There are many factors involved in business start-up, from applying for licensing to securing financing, to understanding routes to market. And those factors can have an impact on turning one’s passion into a profitable business. Getting guidance from someone who has been there themselves as an entrepreneur, or business owner can be a significant asset. It may take some of the stress out of the unknown, and help lead to a better business growth, development and survival.

As Oliver Pawle, chairman of the Centre for Entrepreneurs states: “With many businesses set to close, and unemployment rising, it is entrepreneurs that will drive Britain’s much-needed economic recovery and create new jobs.”

And Emma Jones, founder of Enterprise Nation says: “We’ve seen a wealth of people start businesses. People across the land are spotting gaps in the market and seeing how customers are buying in different ways. The entrepreneurial nature of British people has come to the fore in recent months… We have heard a huge cry from small businesses for content, education and training to do more online.”

In summary, as noted, we would love you to voluntarily subscribe to the map, to help us, and yourself, and of course the good people behind mentoring and incubators.

And finally, we wish you every success in your entrepreneurial endeavours !

Gopendra Mishra (Gopi), Alexandra Willcox (Alex), Muhitur Rahman (MR) and Anja Badri-Parker (Anja) – all Volunteers for Global MapAid