Figures from the Scottish Government's SME Access to Finance survey 2012 show that more small and medium sized businesses in Scotland are successfully applying for finance with an increased proportion of those seeking new lending securing all of the money they applied for.
The Scottish Government's SME Access to Finance report for 2012 shows that 87 percent of firms were able to access a hundred per cent of the money that they were seeking. This is up on the comparable figure of 79 percent from the 2009 and 2010 survey data. When looking over the last year, 9 percent of firms were seeking new lending, with 32 percent looking to renew existing facilities.
Linda Hanna, company growth director at Scottish Enterprise, said: "These findings are broadly in line with what our customers are telling us. While there are still some issues in relation to bank lending, we're balancing our determination to secure more lending by working very closely with the banks, with helping companies develop and present their ambitions in a compelling way so that we help create and stimulate more demand.
"Our Yes to Growth campaign is a key way we're trying to stimulate that demand while we've also recruited a new team of financial readiness specialists to ensure we can work with more companies to help access finance over the next year."
We offer a range of financial assistance and support to help companies access finance for their business. This includes:
- Regional Selective Assistance, R&D and SMART grants to help companies respond to new commercial opportunities
- A range of equity investment options, with funding of £20,000 to £2 million available through the Scottish Investment Bank (SIB), where we co-invest with the private sector in Scottish companies
- The Scottish Loan Fund, also from SIB, which offers companies, with significant growth or export potential, mezzanine debt finance of £250,000 to £5 million
- Financial readiness support to help companies present an attractive proposition to potential funders - over the next year, we will work with up to 500 companies through our financial readiness programme
In addition, we are continuing to develop closer relationships with banks and other financial bodies to develop a 'funding team' approach to working with Scottish companies to try and remove barriers to bank lending.
More about our funding options