British Business Bank

As the UK Government’s national economic development bank, the British Business Bank’s mission is to drive economic growth by helping smaller businesses get the finance they need to start, scale and stay in the UK.

In doing so, the Bank helps capture the economic value of innovation for the UK and create jobs and prosperity for people across the country. With a mainly commercial approach that delivers a return for taxpayers, the Bank’s goal is to catalyse private markets to broaden the range of choice for smaller businesses seeking finance.

The British Business Bank operates through three core pillars of activity — Investment, Banking, and Development:

• Investment. Through the Investment business, the Bank invests in funds and directly in companies, crowding in private capital to the venture and growth markets that fuel innovative companies’ growth. This helps the globally competitive businesses of the future to access the scaleup capital they need to grow in the UK. The Bank is now the largest investor in British venture and venture growth capital funds, the most active late-stage investor in UK deeptech and life sciences, and backed a quarter of all British academic spinout deals in 2022–24. The Bank has also invested in 59% of the UK’s current unicorns.

• Banking. Through the Banking business, the Bank increases lending to businesses through Start Up Loans for new entrepreneurs, and by using government-backed guarantees and other financial instruments to reduce risk and increase capacity for finance providers so that they offer loans to a much wider range of businesses.

• Business Development. Underpinning the Investment and Banking businesses is the Bank’s Business Development function, which focuses on broadening its network of private sector partners to crowd in more capital, with a particular focus on building regional funding ecosystems by connecting capital to a wider range of businesses and entrepreneurs across the UK.

Further reading

• British Business Bank —  Five-year Strategic Plan

• British Business Bank — Who we are

• British Business Bank — Finance Finder tool

• British Business Bank — Start Up Loans