Bradford beats London for business startups, says new study

Bradford has ranked above London in a new survey which examines factors likely to affect new businesses.

The rankings, published for the first time by startupgeek.com, compared 40 towns and cities across the UK, looking at a variety of metrics from internet speed and rental costs to graduate retention levels and startup survival rates.

Bradford performed well, ranking 26th, beating London at number 27 and just three places behind Leeds, despite being 40 per cent smaller by population than its neighbour.

Sankar Sivarajah, Professor of Technology Management and Circular Economy in the Faculty of Management, Law & Social Sciences, said: “The message is ‘Come to Bradford for business.’ This is great news for our city and district. London has a number of universities in close proximity, we have one and yet we beat them.

“When you consider where we are geographically and look at our population compared to somewhere like Leeds, what this says is we’re punching above our weight. It says Bradford is a good place to start a business.”

He added: “It’s also a good place to study business. We have an award-winning business school with excellent links to local businesses and industry. Our programmes are skills focused.”

The startupgeek study compared comparisons between Bradford / London included: five-year office space cost (£35,000 / £94,000), survival rate (42 per cent / 39.3 per cent), five year total startup cost £898,350 / £1,125,810) and download speeds (62.9 / 66.39 Mbits/sec)

University of Bradford School of Management has a globally recognised Triple Crown Accreditation from the Association of MBAs, EQUIS (European Foundation for Management Development accreditation) and AACSB (Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business). Out of about 14,000 business schools globally, it is one of only 90 to have that status and it does position the school as one of the elite business schools. Bradford was also one of the first universities in the UK to start offering an MBA programme.

Prof Sankar added: “We are proud to have created an environment that enables current and future business leaders to flourish and to make a difference in the world.”