Business Angels Blooming

Retail outlets are closing up shop in the UK. UK banks are struggling to make sense of early stage or high risk investments – as they always have, and this is happening across the world.

At the same time Regional Development agencies are being closed and dismantled in the UK and the ‘free to present’ opportunities for entrepreneurs to meet business angels are due to be shut or ‘transferred’ in the next few months.

So, in this grim climate, can it really be said that the business angel investment sector is blooming?

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A Budget for Business Angels and some (but not all) Entrepreneurs…

There were some joyous early reactions to today’s budget particularly on the lunchtime news when Dragon’s Den’s Deborah Meadon among others got excited by the Chancellor’s tax windfall for VCs and how she could now take more risks with early stage companies… but exactly how much risk will business angels and VCs now take?

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Will it be a Budget for Business Angels or Entrepreneurs?

The government are hoping to close up any loopholes that allow wealthy investors to take advantage of tax breaks while also launching the most pro-growth Budget for a generation – can they pull it off?

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Business Angels and Startups Going Global!

The entire landscape of early stage funding is in a state of flux – new innovations in funding models are emerging to threaten the traditional status quo  and the world has become a smaller place for those adventurous entrepreneurs willing to take a risk internationally.

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3 (Very Different) Approaches to Angel Investing

Even though only 3% of businesses actually consider equity funding from business angels in the UK, three  different models of funding have emerged to try and bridge the gap between start-up entrepreneurs and business angels.

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2011 – Year of the Business Angel?

2011 will be the year of the business angel as all the Business Angel as all the latent angel investors who didn’t bother risking it in 2010 decide this will be the year to jump in and live dangerously.

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Why Business Angels Committed Less Cash in 2010

Far from plugging the funding gap, the latest statistics from the US reveal that business angels are now committing less of their cash in new business according to figures released in the first and second quarters of this year.

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Why Business Angels Need to be in Tune with Start-ups

Should business angels listen more carefully to the needs of start-ups as well as working on their own image?

Most of what we read about business angels’ relationships with start-ups revolves around how much they should invest and what start-ups can do to attract business angel funding.

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Rise of the Super Business Angels

A new breed of business angel has arrived on the scene, they’re aggressive, super agile and loaded with cash to invest.  They have already upset the picking order as they fill a niche between your average angel investor and VC firms and threaten the dominance of the latter.

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An Extinction Level Event for Seed Funding?

New venture funding is the lowest it’s been for a decade according to Nesta’s July report Venture Capital Now and After the Dotcom Crash and that’s not all…

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By Dr Smith – the Good Bad and Very Ugly

Most of the time the partnerships which form between founders and angel investors are productive but, in a few cases, I have seen it turn very destructive.

Companies that should have realized success have been held back by investor partnerships that have severely limited their potential or, in some cases, doomed them to failure…

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Budget Puts the Squeeze Business Angels

in this latest emergency Budget the Chancellor has gone out of his way to show that Britain may be weighed down by a mammoth budget deficit to reduce, but it is still open for business. Or is it?

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UK budget provides unexpected boost to entrepreneurs

Entrepreneurs can now claim Capital Gains Tax relief on up to £5m worth of business sales in a lifetime – this is up from £2m in March and £1m only 6 months ago.

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If personality is no guide to start-up success – what is?

Business angels will already know this in their gut, but a recent survey of entrepreneurial literature has told us, here at iBusinessAngel, that personality is no guide to success.

Various firms have been developing psychometric tests to identify the personality traits of a successful entrepreneur and it turns out, that there is no agreement on whether any of these work. So what can research tell us?

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Women business angels expected to rise in 2010

A new national programme to attract women into business angel investing has been announced by Finance South East and the British Business Angels Association (BBAA)

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Where Business Angel Investors Fear to Tread

Investors in early stage and start-up businesses are known as angel investors. The tag ‘angel’ coming from their tendency to operate in the margins where venture capitalists, banks and other backers choose not to go.

They also help plug a major funding gap to get such ventures off the ground and they happen to be the kind of investors who are prepared to take a risk, rely on their instincts and invest large sums without too many hard questions asked.

At least this is the accepted view.

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How should Entrepreneurs and Investors cope with a Second Recession?

In the first recession investors wanted business plans that offered new simplified services or goods that make things work better (ie. increase efficiency – such as self-service on the web for better prices) or that reduce costs (such as better conferencing or collaboration on the web allowing businesses to cut corporate travel). However, as opinions [...]

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