Figures released at
the launch of the 2008 Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM)
UK survey today at Aston Business School, Birmingham, reveal that Inner London
is an entrepreneurial hotspot with an average rate of 9.4% over the period 2002
to 2008, compared with around 5.7% for the UK as a whole.
The report, which
draws on seven years of survey data on 160,000 respondents, provides a unique
picture of business start-up activity across the UK. Professor Mark Hart of Aston Business
School, co-author of the report, said
“London is a world city, more comparable in
entrepreneurship terms to other world cities than other regions of the UK.
“People living in
the UK’s
capital city are twice as likely as people in other regions to indicate that
they expected to set up a new business within the next three years. But it is
in Inner London that the bulk of entrepreneurial activity takes place in the
capital. Outer London
has average levels of entrepreneurial activity.”
The report found
that London had higher rates of business start-up,
higher rates of business closure, and average rates of established business
ownership, suggesting a more rapid turnover of businesses in London
than in other parts of the UK.
Dr Jonathan Levie, of the Hunter Centre for
Entrepreneurship at the University
of Strathclyde, co-author
of the report, explained: “Inner London has an unusually high transient
population, with a high proportion of migrants and ethnic minorities, and these
groups tend to have higher rates of entrepreneurial activity anyway. But what
is intriguing is that those born and bred in London also have high levels of
entrepreneurial activity. There is definitely something special about London. Its concentration
of highly qualified and aspiring people and great wealth is a winning combination
as far as entrepreneurship is concerned. ”
For further information on the UK GEM research project please contact Mark Hart.
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