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Raising Finance: Overcoming the Barriers Created by Stereotypes

Raising Finance: Overcoming the Barriers Created by Stereotypes

Suzanne Noble June 29, 2015 , , ,

I launched Frugl, a London-aimed bargains and deals platform for people on a budget, back in 2014. In this age of austerity, it was an idea I truly believed in and backed it with my own risk, funding our initial app by selling my house. One year on and we now have close to 20,000 active users, regularly list more than 200 activities per month and have just launched a marketplace for small and medium enterprises and event promoters to list and manage their own events and offers. We are ripe for growth, which is why I am crowdfunding new investment using a platform called Syndicate Room (SR). This, however, is not without potential pitfalls such as finding investors, revising and adjusting financial forecasts and spending a lot of time in meetings. Today’s funding environment The idea ... »

Jack Bedell-Pearce - 4D Hosting

November 28, 2013

Jack Bedell-Pearce Managing Director 4D Hosting About 4D Hosting 4D Hosting is a provider of premium hosting solutions for small businesses, geeks and developers. We back this with exceptional, 24/7 service from highly qualified, UK-based engineers. We have delivered market-leading services since 1999 and are an independent UK host which specialises in VPS (virtual servers), reseller, exchange email and web hosting products. About our business expert, Jack Bedell-Pearce Jack (32) has over 12 years of commercial, operational and technical experience. He is responsible for the day-to-day running of the company and the management of the senior technical and administration teams. He started out as an IT consultant for Accenture, contracting for major utility companies including Centrica (Briti... »

Neil Shorney - Nsales

June 20, 2013

Neil Shorney Director Naturally Sales Ltd About Naturally Sales Ltd Naturally Sales helps businesses around the world to succeed through improved sales, leadership, presentation skills and Microsoft Excel. About our business expert, Neil Shorney With 15 years of sales experience and 10 years of leadership, training and coaching across diverse industries, Neil is well placed to offer advice to businesses both large and small on how to succeed commercially. A particular interest of Neil’s is recruiting junior salespeople and helping them to succeed through a combination of formal training, informal coaching and ongoing motivation and development. Neil is a strong believer in forming long-term business relationships. To do this, it’s vital that customers are treated as potential partner... »

Stephen Fear - Fear Group

May 14, 2013

Stephen Fear Entrepreneur & Businessman Fear Group About Fear Group Fear Group focuses on international corporate and property acquisitions and investments and has a particular interest in Latin America, the USA and the UK. About our business expert, Stephen Fear Bristol born entrepreneur, Stephen Fear, first went into business at the age 15 after reading an article in the Financial Times that would affect the way industrial ovens were cleaned. Stephen then used a red phone-box on the council estate where he grew up in Bristol and persuaded an American firm to send over its oven products for him to sell in the UK. Before he knew it, Stephen was trading with some of the largest names in catering under the company name of Easy Clean. Fear later sold this business for £100,000 and i... »

Graham Brough - Rosetta Tax LLP

March 4, 2013

Graham Brough Consultant Rosetta Tax LLP About Rosetta Tax LLP Rosetta Tax is a boutique law firm, specialising in providing ‘City’ quality, cost-effective tax advice to businesses of all kinds. Our senior, specialized tax advisers are a mixture of barristers and solicitors, and we work together to offer a seamless, cross-disciplinary service with links to a network of other key specialists, so we can provide a one stop shop for all your tax advice needs. About our business expert, Full Graham Brough Graham Brough is a tax lawyer with many years of experience providing UK tax advice for businesses of all sizes in the UK and overseas. Having worked in large law firms in the City of London for over ten years, Graham is now a consultant with Rosetta Tax where he focuses on providi... »

Neil Graham - CashFlows

March 4, 2013

Neil Graham CEO CashFlows About CashFlows CashFlows is the only UK non-bank to hold principal licenses with both Visa and MasterCard, which allows them to accept both credit and debit card payments and issue Visa or MasterCard payments cards. CashFlows offers an alternative to traditional banking through a unique account which encompasses all the payment and banking services a business needs under one roof. The CashFlows Account is the industry’s first business banking solution that consolidates a wide range of financial services into a single account, giving businesses control over the money coming in and going out of their business and helping them get paid quicker. The account includes the following services: merchant account, payment gateway, payments services (such as Faster pay... »

Ben Dyer, SellerDeck

January 22, 2013

Ben Dyer CEO SellerDeck About SellerDeck SellerDeck is one of the UK’s top suppliers of ecommerce and point of sales systems to small and medium-sized businesses. With more than 5,000 customers and 16 years’ experience, SellerDeck supplies everything your business needs to succeed online and in-store. About our business expert, Ben Dyer By day Ben is CEO of SellerDeck (formerly Actinic Desktop). Since 2008 he has been giving advice about making a success of selling online on a variety of business websites, so if there’s anything you want to know, ask away. By night Ben heads up a start-up, PoweredNow.com, that he plans to launch in 2013. It is an app suite that makes business admin and invoicing easier for tradesmen and other field-based business people. In a previous life he worked in sof... »

Shiona Davies - BDRC Continental

January 22, 2013

Shiona Davies Director and Author of the SME Finance Monitor BDRC Continental About BDRC Continental BDRC Continental is an award winning insight agency. We help our clients get closer to their customers by translating data into business intelligence. We do this through our range of market-leading insight tools, a dedicated suite of advanced analytics and over two decades of experience working with leading service sector brands across the globe. About our business expert, Shiona Davies Shiona Davies is the author of the SME Finance Monitor, a quarterly report looking into SMEs and their access to finance. This independent report, published by BDRC Continental, is used by government, banks and business groups to inform the debate around lending to SMEs and has been quoted widely in the nati... »

David Barker - 4D Data Centres

October 9, 2012

David Barker Founder & Technical Director 4D Data Centres About 4D Data Centres 4D Data Centres runs one of the few independently owned data centre businesses in the UK. This Tier 3 data centre operator is based at its own flagship data site in Surrey, and also provides colocation and connectivity services in three other data centres in The City, London Docklands and Kent. Other services include server colocation, dedicated servers, leased lines, ADSL lines and managed services. About our business expert, David Barker David Barker founded the company in 1999 at age 14. Since then he’s masterminded 4D’s development into the fully-fledged colocation and connectivity provider that it is today. As technical director, David is responsible for the on-going strategic overview of 4... »

Charles Black - Nasstar

April 30, 2012

Charles Black Chief Executive Officer Nasstar About Nasstar Nasstar provides ‘Cloud’ computing services to firms of all sizes, but generally not firms with fewer than 20 staff. About our business expert, Charles Black Internet entrepreneur Charles Black founded publicly quoted IT hosted services company Nasstar in January 1998. Nasstar was a pioneer and is a leader in application service provision. Today, this is better known as ‘Cloud’ computing. Charles was a very early advocate of the Internet. In 1994 he chose to study the legal issues surrounding the distribution of information on the Internet for a University research paper, later published by Tolley’s Communications Law. Before setting up Nasstar Charles completed his legal training, qualifying as a bar... »

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