The UK is open for business

It is important to have cross-border competition. The more, the better.

Neelie Kroes
European Commission for Competition

French cosmetics giant L’Oreal announces that it is to take over The Body Shop.

Drinks group Pernod Ricard buys UK rival Allied Domecq.

Japan’s Nippon acquires British glass-maker Pilkington.

The recent spate of foreign acquisitions has barely raised a British eyebrow.

No doubt it’s because more than 25 per cent of all London-based businesses are already foreign owned, and the UK capital is home to 13,510 foreign businesses from 92 countries.

Unlike some European Union (EU) countries seeking to protect local firms against competition, the UK doesn’t foster national champions or ‘special sectors’.

Instead, it has set up as the capital for global business and open competition.

Encouraging global champions

EU competition commissioner Neelie Kroes has called the idea of domestic champions “outdated.”

”I am more in favour of global champions located in Europe,” she says.

We (the UK) certainly have a positive attitude towards enterprise and entrepreneurs.

Rebecca Harding
Chief Executive
Global Entrepreneurship Monitor

“It is important to have cross-border competition. The more, the better.”

The fact that the UK shares Kroes’s attitude has made it a natural domicile for global champions.

A natural home for entrepreneurs

According to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, the UK attracted US$219 billion in foreign direct investment in 2005, beating even the USA.

Amgen, ‘the godfather of biotech’, and Indian information-technology giant Infosys are among the most recent arrivals.

Above all, the UK is a place that values enterprise.

From easyJet’s Greek-born Stelios Haji-Ioannou to Sir Gulam Noon, the Indian-born entrepreneur who made curry a British institution, foreign-born British-based entrepreneurs have acquired a cult status.

School for enterprise

This is one reason why, according to the 2005 Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM), 13 per cent of young people aged 18 to 24 expect to be running their own business within three years.

“Young people are beginning to see success stories and they want to be entrepreneurs themselves,” says GEM chief executive Rebecca Harding.

“Is it about an intrinsic appetite for enterprise? I’d hesitate to say we’re entrepreneurial and other countries aren’t – but we certainly have a positive attitude towards enterprise and entrepreneurs.”

Entrepreneurs return the respect.

In a survey of 348 foreign-born executives conducted by international business school Cranfield School of Management, almost 100 per cent thought they had developed a better understanding of global business as a result of working in London.

Attracting the best

In turn, the UK benefits from a ‘honey-pot’ economy, attracting the best people from around the globe, soon through a revamped points system for highly skilled immigrants.

Indeed, Cushman & Wakefield Healey & Baker’s European Cities Monitor voted London Europe’s best city for business in terms of access to qualified employees, with a strong lead over both Paris and Frankfurt.

Describing the capital as a ‘global magnet’, Think London research manager Marc Hardwick points out that “London attracts the most ambitious individuals from within the UK and from the rest of the world.”

“Its strength rests on its outward-looking, internationalist attitude,” he said.

“London has benefited greatly from a more open approach to migration than some of its competitors,” Think London chief executive Michael Charlton wrote to the Financial Times newspaper in March.

Mr. Charlton concluded by saying: “This is particularly important for businesses from emerging markets such as India and China.”