News and information for West Oxfordshire’s businesses - 04 Feb 21
Business grant update
I would like to start by thanking all businesses for their patience during what has been a testing time dealing with multiple grant schemes, each with different guidance. We really do understand how challenging this has been for businesses and the team have been working as fast as possible to distribute what we know is vital funding.
Money is now hitting business bank accounts and by the end of next week we will have paid all outstanding grants to businesses whose details we had and with whom we corresponded by email. We are also processing new applications and payments are being issued to these too.
We have processed over 770 grants and have paid out £2.6m since November.
Anyone who feels they may be still eligible for a grant can still apply via our website.
'Smart' is Innovate UK’s open grant funding programme. Smart is open for organisations with game-changing and commercially viable innovative or disruptive ideas. All proposals must be business focused.
Applications can come from any area of technology and be applied to any part of the economy, such as, but not exclusively:
the arts, design and media
creative industries
science or engineering
Organisations must be UK registered and can apply for a share of up to £25 million. The deadline for applications is Wednesday 26 May 2021.
Small Business Britain has recently published its latest Small Business Resilience report which analyses what it takes for small businesses to succeed in a crisis like COVID. The report incorporates insight from thousands of small businesses and acts as a guide on how to make your business more likely to survive.
The deadline for 2021 Oxfordshire Apprenticeship Awards entries and nominations have been extended to midnight on Monday 08 February 2021. The Awards are a fantastic way to focus on something positive at a difficult time - showcase your business, celebrate the achievements of your star apprentices and recognise the dedication of the colleagues who support them.
Several business groups are coming up trumps with help and advice for businesses. The ones below are good but do also check the trade association for your own sector.
Enterprise Nation - a vibrant community of small businesses and business advisers with a website packed full of resources
UK Hospitality - represents the broad hospitality sector – covering everything from bars, coffee shops, contract catering, hotels, nightclubs, visitor attractions and other leisure venues
MD2MD - helps managing directors compare notes on business MD to MD. Now operating online with a free trial period for qualifying business leaders.
Keeping up to date
Please forward this email to others to whom this might be useful and encourage them to sign up to further updates. Please note that you can access previous editions of this newsletter too.
The council Coronavirus web pages have updates about business support, communities and leisure, bins and recycling, elections and council meetings, planning, building and council news.
We hope you found this newsletter useful. We would like them to be as relevant as possible so please let us know what you think and don’t forget to send us your news to business@westoxon.gov.uk
I would like to start by thanking all businesses for their patience during what has been a testing time dealing with multiple grant schemes, each with different guidance. We really do understand how challenging this has been for businesses and the team have been working as fast as possible to distribute what we know is vital funding.
