The Government needs you. Specifically, they want your views as part of a call for evidence into the future of tax for entrepreneurs, which closes soon. This is your chance to influence it by completing our latest Entrepreneurs Survey.
Investment tax reliefs, employee share schemes, and the tax treatment of founder exits are all under consideration. Your responses will directly shape the evidence we submit.
Beyond this, your answer will inform how the Government, political parties and the media understand entrepreneurs. Your views will also set the agenda for what we work and campaign on.
It only takes around 10 minutes to complete, but will be felt in the policies that impact you and your business for years to come.
Master Stroke
Time entrepreneurs spend on administrative compliance is time they don’t spend growing their companies. Fragmented and opaque processes also enable fraud and slow down access to finance. There is a solution: The Master Key.
In our latest paper, published with Enterprise Nation and Xero, we make the case for a Unique Business Identifier combined with Verified Credentials — a “Master Key” that puts entrepreneurs in control.
Countries like Singapore, Australia and New Zealand already use this model, and the UK has laid much of the legislative groundwork. The final steps could deliver a productivity boost for Britain’s 5.7 million SMEs.
It’s time for Britain to beat bureaucracy.
Cool Operator
Our latest UK AI Fieldbook interview (supported by OpenAI) features our formidable Adviser Rodolfo Rosini of Vaire Computing.
As well as explaining Rodolfo’s audacious aim of near-zero energy computing, Mann Virdee draws out policy lessons from the frontline of building a foundational hardware company: use the state as an early customer rather than grants, fund measurable outcomes not academic approaches, and fix the UK’s scaling gap by improving capital markets and easing entry for top technical talent.
Read, like and subscribe here (especially if you need a clear explainer on reversible computing).
STEM the Flow
The Government is considering a Migration Advisory Committee recommendation to remove the PhD salary discount under the Skilled Worker visa. Today, firms can hire immigrant STEM PhDs from £33,400, but this would rise to £41,700 absent the discount. If you’ve hired — or are considering hiring — STEM PhDs via this route, please complete this short form.
Stamp it Out
As every economist (worthy of the name) knows, Stamp Duty Land Tax acts as a major barrier to mobility, discouraging moves for work, limiting firms’ ability to recruit across regions and reducing labour-market flexibility. That’s why we’re backing our Adviser Andrew Dixon OBE’s petition calling for a full Independent Review of Stamp Duty. You might want to as well.
Good Advice
As our WhatsApp Community already knows, we’ve soft-launched a website page directing founders to support. Support for UK Entrepreneurs (SEO rules everything around me) does exactly what it says on the tin — but it’s still a work in progress, and we’d like your help building it out.
We’d especially welcome suggestions from: entrepreneurs who’ve benefited from great advice, investors who share useful resources, public sector teams running overlooked support, operators who see recurring founder problems, advisers who help navigate complexity, ecosystem builders who connect people to the right help, and providers offering something special to our community.
Onyertrain
Are you plugged into Birmingham’s or Exeter’s entrepreneurial ecosystem? If not, here’s your chance to meet (nearly) everyone who matters locally — and others like you.
Our Ecosystem Builders events are deliberately light-touch but designed for deep connections. If you’re travelling in, you can also work from the space for the day, so it won’t interrupt your workflow (and you get to spend the day with us).
Birmingham is on 5 March (find out more here), and Exeter is on 24 April (find out more here).