Alternative Funding Set To Become More Widespread in 2017

14th November 2016

Results From Survey Of MADE Festival Attendees The popularity of alternative business funding models including peer-to-peer and crowdfunding looks set to continue in 2017, according to a survey by national law firm Irwin Mitchell.

The survey, which was carried out at this year's MADE Festival, questioned business owners, entrepreneurs and investors from across the UK. It found that 91% thought that they are more likely to access or recommend alternative funding than 12 months ago with almost half (47%) claiming to have invested through peer to peer or crowdfunding in the last year. One third of respondents said debt funding and equity funding held the same level of risk while 43% said that the cost of finance from banks was going up. Three out of 10 said it was about the same. The survey found that only 47% of entrepreneurs thought that the current Government is committed to supporting SMEs. Andrea Cropley, Corporate partner at Irwin Mitchell, said: -The latest results show that alternative funding is becoming more widely used and accepted. -Businesses and investors seem less concerned about the lack of regulatory uncertainty and believe that the greatest hurdle for it becoming more widely used is lack of understanding. Accessibility certainly doesn't appear to be a big barrier whilst in previous years, it has appeared to be. MADE is the UK's largest festival of enterprise and took place in Sheffield on 8 November 2016. Irwin Mitchell has sponsored the festival since it was launched and this year Corporate partner Andrea Cropley chaired the panel debate titled: 'From the high street to the crowd the great financial debate'. In addition to this, the firm hosted a fringe event examining the differences between traditional sources of funding and those more innovative approaches, such as crowdfunding.