LONDON, 10th May 2022 – Capitalise, the small business finance platform has partnered with OPPORTUNI, a UK based scale-up company dedicated to levelling the playing field for SMEs by helping them win, and service, major government contracts.
OPPORTUNI are already on a mission to help support small businesses bid for, and win, trajectory-changing government tenders. These small businesses are typically more agile and flexible than medium and large businesses or enterprises, but access to funding is causing challenges when it comes to winning or serving major contracts, such as Council tenders, NHS tenders, and Government tenders.
Capitalise therefore aims to fill this gap by connecting OPPORTUNI’s small business userbase with the external finance required to support, or entirely fund, major contract wins. As part of the partnership, OPPORTUNI aim to redirect £225 billion worth of government procurement spend to small businesses. In 2021, OPPORTUNI already helps to redirect of £1bn of this number to SMEs.
As part of the partnership, small businesses signed up for OPPORTUNI will now have access to over 100 lenders from a single finance application process, to help select a funding product which is right for them.
Supporting business owners with financial services is imperative to business success. Capitalise’s recent Get fit for Business report, revealed that 58 per cent of business leaders need help understanding their options for business finance. However, this figure rose to a whopping 84 per cent of businesses in Construction, Engineering or Manufacturing.
Furthermore, 59 per cent believe that they don’t have the time to apply for business finance and almost half wouldn’t even know who to task for advice about business finance. Interestingly, this figure rose to 71 per cent of small business owners working in the professional services and finance sector.
This is in spite of the fact that nearly two-thirds (61 per cent) admitted that they need business finance to achieve their goals for 2022, especially in light of a major government tender win.
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Oliver Cummings, Commercial Director at Capitalise, commented:
“OPPORTUNI are doing incredible work in opening new avenues for small businesses, and putting them on the map when it comes to bids for lucrative government contracts, which are traditionally only ever won by major enterprises.
“Small businesses are looking to grow this year, and are certainly up for the challenge of taking on major government contracts. However, funding is often the metric that holds them back, and prevents them from scaling quickly.
“That’s why this partnership is so important. We’re able to empower businesses with confidence, enabling them to apply for tenders knowing they’ve got all the support and resources they need to competently service them.”
Tim Ward, CEO of OPPORTUNI, commented:
“Our mission is to find great SMEs who should be winning government contracts, and ultimately make it easier for them to find these contracts and win them. These are the companies who should be fixing the roads, providing the cleaning services for our local hospitals and schools, securing our government buildings and civic centres, and so much more.
“We are therefore thrilled to be partnered with Capitalise, this allows us to offer a range of financial solutions which support businesses in scaling up to deliver significant contracts. The financial offering provides cost effective options for OPPORTUNI customers winning government contracts”
