Entrepreneurs

There is no other bank like Barclays for the people who create and build businesses; our support for the entrepreneurial community goes beyond funding solutions, and includes expert advice and mentoring, leading insights, as well as access to essential networks. This commitment forms part of Barclays’ Citizenship agenda, and permeates across the group, from grass roots skills provision to product and thought leadership perspectives.

Barclays has a rich history, spanning more than three centuries, in supporting and driving innovation. Each year we support over 100,000 start-ups with nearly a third of these going on to export in their first 12 months of business. We have a relentless focus on pioneering innovation, and a commitment to fostering the emergence of new business and technologies today.

Barclays’ holistic approach is helping to establish a long-term pipeline of high growth businesses, ultimately driving job creation and economic growth at a local and national level. Since 2012, Barclays employees have volunteered more than 18,700 (18,710) hours to help deliver enterprise skills training in the communities in which we operate.

Our offering is uniquely based on our ability to help businesses no matter how large they grow, and our understanding of and support for the individuals behind them. Using our expertise to support progress in this way can make a powerful difference, and as such Barclays aims to be the partner of choice for people and organizations seeking to address social and economic challenges.

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Videos from this campaign

Content from this campaign

Environment

Unreasonable Impact | Don’t Throw Away Your Utensils…Eat Them!
Bakey’s has developed edible utensils to provide an effective alternative to petroleum-based disposable plastic cutlery. The edible utensils contain no chemicals, preservatives, fat, emulsifiers, artificial coloring, or milk products. Now, instead of throwing away cutlery after a single use, people can eat it, or it will biodegrade in fewer than three days. Bakey’s is targeting a customer base of one billion, helping to avoid 5 million tons of plastic going to landfill.

Environment

Unreasonable Impact | One of the World’s Largest Electric Vehicle Fleets Is Providing Tomorrow’s Transportation, Today
Based in India, Lithium Urban Technologies is pioneering a shift toward more sustainable urban mobility, operating the most productive electric vehicle fleet in the world. This company is India’s first 100 percent, zero emission transport service, providing a large fleet of electric vehicles (EVs) along with highly trained and certified drivers. With the lowest energy cost per kilometer on the market, Lithium offers the cheapest and cleanest commercial transport option on the market – and it’s the largest fleet outside of China.

Innovation & Technology

Unreasonable Impact | Bringing Space and its Data Within Reach for People Everywhere, Every Day
Axelspace is making access to space – and its data – an everyday reality with smaller, more flexible satellites. Until now, high-resolution satellite imagery has been an expensive and low-frequency service, often left to national governments. But now, with the increasingly low costs of microsatellite technology, it’s possible to provide high-frequency coverage of the entire Earth to private companies or research institutions. This company captures imagery of the entire planet’s surface with human activities once every single day, enabling things like accurate forecasts of the best harvest times and detection of illegal logging.

Sustainable Finance & Socially Responsible Investment

Unreasonable Impact | Improving Job and Food Security for 30 Million Farmers in India
In eastern India, around 30 million farmers tend to an acre or less of land, where they can’t access most of the available renewable groundwater or reliable agriculture-grade electricity. In a country that will be the world’s most populous in a matter of years, the need is dire for increased agricultural productivity. Khethworks has developed a solar-powered irrigation system that allows these small-plot farmers to affordably cultivate year-round.

Innovation & Technology

Unreasonable Impact | This Company’s Unique Technology Will Help Millions Make Safer Food Choices
Vitargent believes that every person should have the information they need to make informed decisions about the products they purchase and consume. Their technology is not only enabling more widespread access to information, but it’s also pioneering the field of safety testing technology using medaka and zebrafish embryos – making animal testing a thing of the past.

Sustainable Development Goals

Unreasonable Impact | The Startup That Will Change the Way China Feeds Its Cities
Beijing-based startup Alesca Life is democratizing access to fresh food by creating solutions that enable anyone anywhere to grow the safest, healthiest, and freshest produce in the most efficient way possible. Their automated indoor food production system is currently growing nutrient-dense produce using no pesticides, no soil, no sunlight, 20-25 times less water, fertilizer, and land compared to traditional farming practices.

Energy

Unreasonable Impact | Clean, Safe, Unlimited Energy for Everyone: Q&A with General Fusion

Supply Chain & the Circular Economy

Unreasonable Impact | Democratizing Manufacturing by 3D Printing From Trash: Q&A with re:3D
Hundreds of millions of people still live in poverty without access to resources that would improve their livelihoods. Often, they have no choice but to rely on sporadic donations from aid agencies that may or may not actually address their needs. What if every household could act as its own factory and personally manufacture exactly what it needed to thrive?

Education

How Barclays is Supporting the Inventors of Tomorrow
Since its launch in 2014, MakerClub has established eight after-school clubs that introduce young people to coding, creative thinking and emerging technologies. Here, director Declan Cassidy reveals his aim to grow that number to 50 across the UK in 2017 – and tells how Barclays is supporting his team’s ambitious plans to develop the ‘inventors of tomorrow’.

Energy

Unreasonable Impact | Finally, the Turbine We’ve Been Waiting For: Q&A with Semtive
Semtive, founded in Buenos Aires with an office in Silicon Valley, builds small wind turbines that function both on and off the grid in any weather conditions. These turbines need only a light breeze to activate, and they can work for individual households, businesses, and industrial applications.

More from Barclays

  1. Entrepreneurs
    There is no other bank like Barclays for the people who create and build businesses; our support for the entrepreneurial community goes beyond funding...

  2. Access to employment
    We will help people gain access to vital skills they need to get into work and support entrepreneurs to scale businesses and create employment...

  3. Access to financial and digital empowerment
    We will improve access to financial services, including developing targeted products and services for individuals and small businesses. We will also...

  4. Access to financing
    We will continue to create access to funding solutions and small business financing. We will also continue to support our Green Bond Treasury...