Scottish Enterprise has been working with companies to help them grow for more than 30 years, along with partners across the public sector. But there’s a new approach for 2022 to help businesses thrive.
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The impact of the COVID pandemic has made people realise Scotland needs a different approach to ensure that every business has the chance to evolve and take on new challenges.
This is an area in which Scottish Enterprise has a wealth of expertise, as part of its mission to create better and greener jobs that nurture shared wealth and collective wellbeing, delivering a sustainable, inclusive, and fair future.
Free research to revolutionise your businesses
Research is one of Scottish Enterprise’s most important services, and domestic and international research data is entirely free to Scottish firms. Making informed decisions is always critical when starting a new venture.
Emily Wilson heads up their Research service and has been involved since 2007: “I lead a team who are dedicated to providing research to Scottish companies. I was there at the beginning when the research service was first formed, it was all very exciting and still is.”
Scottish Enterprise has cleverly pulled together a variety of resources that they can use to help companies excel in their business endeavours. Emily explains: “We have developed and grown and evolved that service over time, initially we had focused on helping start-ups and small-scale businesses, but we now have a much bigger resource in terms of people and tools.”
Help for all
Scottish Enterprise now helps a broad range of companies, sectors and industries of all shapes and sizes. Emily continues: “We now also help established companies who are looking to grow and develop into perhaps new geographic markets, are creating new products or services or are wanting to change what they do. This is especially important as businesses adapt and respond to big challenges like the pandemic and the shift to net zero
“Taking a new direction as a company can be a scary and challenging time, Scottish Enterprise is there to support, guide and make sure companies are fully equipped to take on a new challenge. The reason that the Research Service was created was to solve a problem in the market, one of the key determinants of success for businesses is making decisions based on really strong, robust evidence, rather than just anecdotes or gut feeling.
“We recognise that that’s an incredibly difficult thing for companies to do. We recognise that fast-growing entrepreneurial individuals often don’t have the time, or they don’t know where or how to find the research that they may need to underpin their business decisions. It can often be a case that they’re too busy, or they don’t know where that information exists. Or even if they do know where that information exists, it’s too expensive and cost-prohibitive for them to access.”
Information when you need it
Scottish Enterprise can provide the latest industry trends and forecast data from a range of trusted commercial sources on a huge range of sectors and geographies to help identify and exploit the right growth opportunities, at no cost whatsoever to your firm. Individual company profiles and directories can assist with due diligence, finding suppliers and competitor analysis.
The support provided can be used to drive strategy, validate business plans or build pitches for investment. There are so many great opportunities that can be supported and some of the stories from the companies already helped are really inspiring.
To find out more check out the Scottish Enterprise website.
‘Research helped us win £420,000 of funding’
Based in Edinburgh, SolarisKit has developed and tested the world’s first flat-packable solar thermal collector. SolarisKit aims to become a global leader in the supply of high value solar heating technology for both developing and industrialised countries.
SolarisKit requested research from Scottish Enterprise on Rwanda’s demographics, health and hotel industries, and solar hot water systems (SWHS). Subsequent research was conducted on potential markets for SolarisKit’s products.
The research team provided:
- Rwandan household demographics
- Statistics for Rwandan hotel and health industries
- Research on SHWS usage
- Market insights on glamping and swimming pools.
Scottish Enterprise’s findings were primarily used to support funding applications. SolarisKit was able to secure £420,000 of non-dilutive funding from bodies like Innovate UK, the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Scottish Enterprise and others – a great success for all involved.
