The UK has set ambitious goals for innovation, positioning itself as a hub for science and technology on the global stage. But while the appetite for R&D remains strong, the reality for many businesses is that their ability to claim R&D tax relief now hinges less on ambition and more on compliance.

My journey has been anything but straightforward. I started without a clear blueprint for success, but I learned to spot gaps others ignored, take risks, and turn those insights into a scalable SaaS product.

The wrong AI debate

If you scroll through LinkedIn, you'll see the same headline again and again: AI will replace you. It will steal jobs from marketers, product managers, maybe even founders themselves. That's not what I've seen.

For a long time, video was treated as a marketing luxury. It looked great in a campaign, but when budgets were under pressure, it was one of the first things to go. Ads and owned media content were the must-haves, while video sat in a column marked “would be nice.”

The innovation efforts of many organisations are failing not because of a lack of ideas, but because of how those ideas are measured and managed. That’s the central argument of ‘Expected Value: The System to Align Innovation, Strategy, and Value Creation’, a new book by Simon Hill, CEO of global innovation scaleup Wazoku.

How you introduce your product to the market can shape your startup’s growth trajectory. Freemium and free trial models are two of the most popular approaches allowing businesses to attract users and encourage full adoption.

Nick Perrett spent years building gaming mechanics before losing track of his own pensions – an expensive wake-up call that led him to found Prosper. His contrarian view: ethical fintech isn't just morally right, it's more profitable long-term – and founders who understand this will build the next generation of financial giants.

Striking out on your own to launch a rival tech business could be one of the most exciting but also daunting times of your career. The temptation will be to hand in your notice, fire up your laptop, and start calling prospective clients.

Launching a new business is exhilarating – the energy, the creativity, the vision of building something that’s uniquely yours. But the statistics are sobering. According to ONS data, around one in five UK businesses fail within the first year, and nearly half don’t make it to their fifth birthday.

Away from the pomp and pageantry of Donald Trump’s State Visit to the UK, there was real progress made on business. The record-breaking £150 billion Tech Prosperity Deal of US investment in the UK rightly grabbed a lot of attention. This is the largest-ever single package of commercial investment linked to a State Visit.

After a run of double-digit growth, many founders look to bank the momentum and exit. Increasingly, however, others are turning to Employee Ownership Trusts (EOTs). For these leaders, the priority is building a company that can sustain growth and stay true to its values. In today’s volatile market, independence matters, and so does a culture that helps teams adapt without compromising standards. An EOT provides both: it secures that independence while keeping long-term goals at the centre of decision-making.

A mother-daughter perspective on AI’s impact on future careers.

After spending 15 years leading teams in one of the UK’s largest retailers, I made the bold decision to put everything into my dream: becoming a full-time magician and speaker. On 4th April 2020, I took redundancy – ready to launch the business I had been quietly building for years.

In today’s fast-moving tech world, customer and user data is no longer optional, it’s essential. How a business interprets, contextualises, and applies this data often determines whether it accelerates or stalls. The companies that succeed are those that don’t just react to change, but anticipate it through intelligent, data-led decision-making.

In the world of sports and entertainment travel, where customers are investing not just their money but also their dreams of unforgettable experiences, trust is everything. Trust is something you cannot place a value on, it’s the foundation on which long-lasting customer relationships are built. Without it, even the most sophisticated booking systems or flashy marketing campaigns fall flat, particularly in an industry where competition is rife.

Once an afterthought in most transactions – except in pure technology acquisitions – intellectual property (IP) is moving to the centre of deal-making. Software, data, and AI shape nearly every product and service, and the know-how, data sets, and IP rights behind them increasingly determine whether a deal delivers its growth story.

Since its UK launch in April 2023, Temu has quickly made a name for itself. Last year it was the most downloaded iPhone app in the UK App Store and it’s getting a great reception from its users.

Running a small business is rewarding, but demanding. From serving customers to managing cashflow and dealing with economic uncertainty, you are constantly juggling different demands and roles. The daily grind can also make it easy to forget about your accomplishments, and our latest research shows fewer than half (43%) of small businesses regularly get the opportunity to pause and celebrate their wins.

Over my career I’ve worked with countless startups – some of which have gone on to become household names. The ones that stand out offer more than great products or clever marketing. They have a beating heart. They create moments that make people feel – joy, excitement, pride, nostalgia.

Small and mid-sized businesses have always won on something enterprise giants can’t copy: the personal relationship with their customers. But now those same customers expect AI-powered experiences as part of the service, and the tools on the market are built for companies with entire AI teams, six-month budgets, and enterprise-scale infrastructure. SMBs can’t afford to build that, but they also can’t afford not to have it.