Why Business Navigator?

Businesses need support to grow, and the West of England area is full of resources. Whether you’re a new business or a new social enterprise, growing or looking to become more sustainable, there’s support available to help you make it happen – and Business Navigator will help you to find it.

Who runs Business Navigator?

Director - Martin Coulthard

Martin is an innovative technology entrepreneur who has founded, grown and sold two Bristol companies: Surface Inspection and Stonecube. He then became Director of BEN, the Bath & Bristol Enterprise Network, running more than 50 events for the tech business community.

Editor - Christian Annesley

Christian is an experienced business journalist and communicator. He recently stepped down as the founder editor of South West Business Insider, after four years establishing Insider's regional business monthly magazine and its daily e-bulletin as market leaders.

Who created it?

Business Navigator was originally created by the West of England Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) as a hub to signpost business support for Bristol, Bath and beyond. It is still supported by the LEP at arm’s length, but is now owned and operated by a private company, CareTechnica Ltd. You can read the full story here.

What's the big idea?

Supporting business startups and sustainable business growth is crucial to the UK’s future competitiveness. Growth creates employment, which in turn generates wellbeing, both directly and indirectly (through tax receipts). As such, we must help organisations grow, whether they are driven by profit or social benefit.

What does it cost?

Business Navigator is free to users. The business-support services we currently list are all non-profit organisations, though we have plans to include commercial service providers in 2013. The organisations we list are all reputable, which means you can trust our suggestions. We provide no guarantee, of course!

What happened to Business Link?

Business Link was the government-backed resource many businesses relied on for advice and support – but the service provided by local advisers was closed down in November 2011. However a BusinessLink helpline is still available and a lot of useful information is available on the GOV.UK website