Know Your Limits
We’re backing a new campaign that calls on the Chancellor to raise Britain's investment limits
The Enterprise Investment Scheme (EIS) and Venture Capital Trusts (VCTs) are the backbone of Britain’s innovation economy, fuelling thousands of startups up and down the country. Yet the annual and lifetime investment limits for these schemes have been frozen for nearly a decade. In that time, inflation has eroded their real value, meaning their impact is now roughly three-quarters of what it once was, and could soon fall to half of their 2016 strength if nothing changes.
That’s why we’re backing Growth Beyond Limits, a new campaign calling on the Chancellor to raise the lifetime company investment limit to £30 million, or £40 million for Knowledge-Intensive Companies (KICs), and the annual limit to £15 million, or £25 million for KICs, alongside a commitment to review them every three years. If you believe Britain should back its most innovative businesses with funding that keeps pace with the times, you can read the letter here and sign it alongside me and many others here.
State of AI
Yesterday, Nathan Benaich released his annual State of AI Report 2025. While coming in at over 300 slides, as always, Air Street Capital’s General Partner delivers. There is a lot to unpack, but I’ll focus on one aspect that matters to everyone reading this.
The report covers OpenAI’s new GDPval benchmark, an evaluation launched in September that measures model performance on economically valuable, real-world tasks across 44 occupations. The results are clear: models now rival human experts across many professions.
As many of you will know first-hand, general-purpose models are proving effective as professional assistants, and companies like Lufthansa are forecasting thousands of administrative job cuts by 2030 on the back of AI.
Entry-level jobs are being hit hardest. Hiring for junior software and support roles has stagnated since 2022, even as overall employment rises. Law school applications are up 21% as graduates hedge their bets, while seasoned professionals appear more insulated – for now, at least.
Not everyone agrees this signals an imminent crisis. A Yale–Brookings study suggests AI’s long-term disruption may take decades. Yet both OpenAI and Anthropic report growing use of their models for workplace tasks.
This is largely a good thing – after all, this is what increasing productivity and growth looks like. But if this is the way of the future, entrepreneurial skills will be at a premium. It’s a strange world where being an entrepreneur is a safer bet than some established professions, but that may be where we’re heading.
(I recommend reading it in full. For the futurism-enjoyers, flip to the predictions on slide 11 and then to slide 305. The deck starts with a scorecard on last year’s calls, such as an open-source alternative surpassing OpenAI’s o1 (“YES,” with DeepSeek-R1), and challengers failing to dent NVIDIA’s dominance (“YES”), then lays out ten bold bets for the next 12 months. Highlights include the prediction that a major retailer will get over 5% of online sales from agentic checkout as agent-ad spend hits $5 billion.)
Still Stock-Still?
Last Friday, I discussed Britain’s downturn in listings. What a difference a week makes. Since then, the Manchester-based The Beauty Tech Group listed on the London Stock Exchange with an initial market cap of £300 million, while the pipeline for the first half of 2026 looks promising.
A lot of my job revolves around pointing out how things could be better. But that shouldn’t be mistaken for thinking Britain is the basket case that some seem to think it is. We have cracked, or inherited, many of the hard things that make a country a great place to be an entrepreneur – from world-class universities and a strong rule of law to a global financial centre, a global language, and a culture that prizes creativity and fairness.
Too often, we make the easy things harder than they need to be – through complex taxes, clunky regulation, and slow-moving policymaking. But I like to think these are problems to be fixed, rather than insurmountable barriers to crash up against.
This is why, at The Entrepreneurs Network, we’re optimistic.
Message from our Partner
Zestic AI has announced a new partnership with Proteus, the UK’s leader in strategic change management, to help organisations move from AI pilots to measurable performance. By combining Proteus’ $100 billion transformation dataset and change-management expertise with Zestic AI’s AI-first architecture, the partnership enables companies to embed AI directly into live and new transformation programmes – without disruption. Together, the two firms aim to help Boards and C-suites turn AI from experiment into enterprise capability, accelerating productivity, innovation, and growth. Read the full announcement to learn how the partnership is redefining what intelligent transformation looks like in practice.
Surveys
Entrepreneurs Survey (Final Call)
This is your last opportunity to provide your views on what it is like to be an entrepreneur in the UK – including the challenges you face, and how you feel about the actions being taken by the Government. It should take less than 10 minutes to complete.
Spin-outs
We’re gathering evidence for our next Female Founders Forum report, which will investigate how university spinouts are created in the UK today, and what policy fixes are needed to support their growth. If you have spun out a company from a UK university within the last three years (or are in the process of doing so), or are someone who supports spinouts (e.g. through a TTO, university, funder, or advisory organisation), please consider filling in our survey and sharing it with others. And if you’d like to be interviewed for this research or know someone who should, just drop Anastasia a line.
Our Next Events
Employment Rights Bill: What Does it Mean for Businesses?
🗓 Wednesday, 15 October 2025
🕐 11am to 12pm
📍 Online
ℹ️ A virtual roundtable to discuss the implications of the Government’s Employment Rights Bill on businesses, chaired by Lord Leigh
⏩ Request a place
The Entrepreneurs Network Reception at the House of Lords
🗓 Thursday, 16 October 2025
🕐 12.15pm to 2.30pm
📍 House of Lords
ℹ️ The Entrepreneurs Network is hosting a reception in the Home Room of the House of Lords for our key supporters, entrepreneurs, and the Officers and Advisers to the APPG for Entrepreneurship
⏩ Request a place
Dinner with the Rt Hon Sir Mel Stride MP: The Road to the Autumn Budget
🗓 Tuesday, 21 October 2025
🕐 6.30pm to 9.30pm
📍 Central London
ℹ️ A private dinner to discuss the main priorities, hopes and practical challenges for entrepreneurs ahead of the Autumn Budget
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Roundtable lunch with Alex Depledge MBE, Entrepreneurship Adviser to the Chancellor of the Exchequer
🗓 Tuesday, 22 October 2025
🕐 12pm to 2pm
📍 OakNorth Bank, Soho
ℹ️ Ahead of the Autumn Budget we host the Entrepreneurship Adviser to the Chancellor of the Exchequer
⏩ Request a place
Young Entrepreneurs Forum: Report Launch
🗓 Wednesday, 29 October 2025
🕐 3.30pm to 5pm
📍 House of Lords
ℹ️ An afternoon tea reception in the House of Lords to celebrate the launch of the Young Entrepreneurs Forum’s flagship report
⏩ Request a place
Optimising Accelerators for Full Speed Ahead
🗓 Tuesday, 4 November 2025
🕐 10am to 11am
📍 Mayfair, London
ℹ️ A roundtable hosted by Steve Rigby, to discuss how Britain can build on its strong network of startup support programmes
⏩ Request a place
Ecosystem Builders Meetup: Oxford
🗓 Monday, 10 November 2025
🕐 11am to 12.30pm
📍 Oxford Edge, Oxford
ℹ️ Our first Ecosystem Builders Meetup outside of London at the newly established Oxford Edge in Oxford
⏩ Request a place
Quarterly Adviser Roundtable
🗓 Tuesday, 2 December 2025
🕐 10am to 11.30am
📍 Shoreditch, London
ℹ️ Our quarterly roundtable for Advisers and Patrons of The Entrepreneurs Network
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News and Views
Kemi Badenoch vowed that a future Conservative Government would abolish Stamp Duty on primary residences
The All-Party Parliamentary Group gave a round up of policy pronouncements made so far at the party conferences
We published the latest instalment of our Three Big Ideas series
The National Institute of Economic and Social Research has told the Chancellor that raising Income Tax is the best way to slash the spending deficit (Paywall – The Telegraph)
Both the IMF and Bank of England warned that the boom in AI risks repeating a dotcom bust (Paywall – The Financial Times)
A stronger IPO pipeline for the start of 2026 suggests confidence is returning to Britain
Over 100 experts gave their views on how the Government can get growth going again
Why supporting entrepreneurs can help spread economic opportunity throughout the country
Air Street Capital published their eighth annual State of AI Report
How should we measure the movement of ideas across the economy?
Consensus is killing innovation (Paywall – The Economist)
Rethinking the impacts automation might have on labour markets
A defence of weakening copyright laws – and letting musicians rip each other off
Join us
If you haven’t already, it would be great if you would consider joining The Entrepreneurs Network. Our Supporters, Advisers and Corporate Partners are essential in helping us understand what entrepreneurs need to flourish, and are closely connected with our work. If you are already support us – thank you.
Friends of the Network
US Expansion: Pitfalls and Opportunities in the Current Climate
🗓 Tuesday, 21 October 2025
🕐 8.30am to 10.30am
📍 Kingsley Napley, London
ℹ️ Featuring leading experts who will share practical guidance and strategic considerations for UK companies entering the US market
⏩ Find out more
NEN Business Barometer
⏰️ Closing date: Friday, 31 October 2025
ℹ️ National Enterprise Network (NEN) Business Barometer captures the real experiences, challenges, and opportunities facing start-ups, micros, and the self-employed across the UK
⏩ Find out more
A Manufacturer’s Guide to AI
🗓 Wednesday 5 November 2025
🕐 12pm to 1.3pm
📍 Online
ℹ️ How to effectively use AI to give your manufacturing business the edge
⏩ Find out more
The Easies
⏰ Deadline: Wednesday, 5 November 2025
🏆 $50,000 Prize Fund
ℹ️ The Easies celebrate the boldest early-stage founders globally
⏩ Find out more
Female Founders Afternoon Tea
🗓 Wednesday, 12 November 2025
🕐 3.15pm to 5pm
📍 House of Lords
ℹ️ Featuring leading experts who will share practical guidance and strategic considerations for UK companies entering the US market
⏩ Find out more
Best wishes,
Philip
Philip Salter
Founder
The Entrepreneurs Network