Business clinic: HSBC’s £100m fund will help SMEs grow

HSBC is keen to support growing, ambitious companies across Lancashire and that is why we recently launched a £100m fund to support SMEs across this region with their growth plans.

The fund launch, which is available to businesses with a turnover of up to £30m, is part of a wider £500m pot of money to help businesses across the North West, and £6bn nationally.

A recent piece of HSBC research demonstrated this point exactly. The ‘Business of Growth’ report predicts an increase in fixed investment – physical assets including machinery, premises and stock – of 7.1% in 2014. This compares to a pre-recession average annual investment growth of 3.6%. This figure has also been revised significantly upwards in recent months, marking increased confidence in the recovery.

For example, we recently funded a new climbing wall centre towards the north of our patch for a start-up business, led by an ambitious entrepreneur who developed a career designing climbing walls but had never run his own centre.

These businesses are all creating new jobs and economic growth in their respective communities, but they are typical of the businesses we are supporting each day via the fund.