Ana Stewart, Scotland’s Chief Entrepreneur, has today announced her three priorities to deliver for Scotland’s most ambitious companies.
Calling for a sharper focus on rapidly scaling firms, Stewart will prioritise:
- Closer engagement with founders and the private sector – launching Scotland’s largest annual startup and scaleup survey and working directly with entrepreneurs to shape services around their needs.
- Tailored support for scaleups – designing interventions that support scaleups to access new talent, capital and markets.
- Better measurement of performance and impact – introducing consistent reporting to track progress and provide a transparent picture of Scotland’s entrepreneurial health.
This builds on progress already delivered this year, including multi-year backing for Scottish EDGE, the launch of Dealroom Scotland, and ongoing investment in implementing Stewart’s Pathways report supporting more women to start and scale businesses.
The priorities were announced at the Institute for Small Business and Entrepreneurship Conference at the University of Strathclyde’s Technology and Innovation Centre in Glasgow, where Ana Stewart took part in a keynote session with Professor Eleanor Shaw OBE and Sir Tom Hunter.
According to Ana Stewart, Scotland has made real progress towards becoming a first-rate startup nation.
“That foundation is essential – without a strong pipeline of promising new companies, there can be no scaleups.”
She highlighted the need to have to “follow our founders”, supporting them from the spark of a new idea right through to rapid international growth.
“Scotland has world-class entrepreneurs, and many are the economy’s unsung heroes. We should celebrate and acknowledge their achievements whilst making sure nothing holds them back from growing.
Our entrepreneurs have the talent and ambition to compete on the world stage.
Our job is to remove barriers, connect them with the right support, and make Scotland one of the best HQs to build and scale a business. That is my aspiration.”
Kate Forbes, Deputy First Minister, said:
“Scotland can be proud of the progress made in recent years in building one of Europe’s fastest-growing entrepreneurial economies. That success is down to the talent and drive of our founders, alongside the support of many partners across the ecosystem."
Irene Graham, CEO of the ScaleUp Institute, welcomed Stewart’s approach:
“Collaboration at a national level is a prerequisite for building a high-functioning scaleup ecosystem.
It’s encouraging to see Ana Stewart champion scaleups and put these founders and leaders at the heart of Scotland’s next phase of entrepreneurial growth.”
According to Sir Tom Hunter, Scotland needs a laser focus on building scaling businesses:
“Why? If we double the number of scaleups from the estimated 675 today, we’d create around 75,000 new high value jobs; that drives economic growth."
Lead image: Professor Eleanor Shaw, Sir Tom Hunter, and Scotland's Chief Entrepreneur Ana Stewart. Photo: uncredited.
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