DEALS What’s in store for2015?IT Your essentialtoolkitCLOUD COMPUTINGA silver liningwww.blmgroup.co.ukWWW.EASTMIDLANDSBUSINESSLINK.CO.UKJANUARY 2015EAST MIDLANDS LEADING BUSINESS E-MAGEAST MIDLANDSFASTEST 40 2015Shortlist revealed...Time to move to the cloud. contact us for a free cloud audit!www.demystifythecloud.co.uk @demystifycloud info@demystifythecloud.co.uk Happy New Year! Time to make changes for the better...demystifydemystifyworking in the cloudworking in the cloudEDITOR’S NOTESwww.eastmidlandsbusinesslink.co.uk East Midlands Business Link 3It's that time of year again. Hotel Maiyango, the luxury boutique hotel in the heart ofLeicester, will play host to the East Midlands Fastest 40 Awards evening on 26th February.The awards, which celebrate the cream of young entrepreneurial talent in the East Midlands,are now in their second year, and have been significantly expanded after a host of newsponsors threw their weight behind the event. There are six categories in this year's East Midlands Fastest 40: Overall Winner; FastestOwner-Manager: Fastest in Professional Services; Fastest in Creative Industries; FastestExporter; and Mentor of the Year, and in this month's magazine profile those shortlisted.The standard of entries has again this year been extremely high, which just goes to show thedepth of young business talent we have here in the East Midlands. We're looking forward to agreat awards evening, which I'm delighted to say is near to selling out a month early, and I'dlike to extend my thanks to our sponsors and supporters for their hard work and backing.Whilst we will always cover the established names in the region, the next generation ofbusiness champions are equally as important to the economic performance of the EastMidlands. The East Midlands Fastest 40 will help bring to prominence those 40 or under whoare making a very real difference to their companies, and the wider world of business.We'll of course be covering all the winners in our March issue, but for this month, happyNew Year and here's to a prosperous 2015.Sam MetcalfEditorThe young onesContentsJanuary 2015Latest News 6The latest news from the regionProperty News 9All the latest from the property sectorManufacturing News 12News and views from around the East MidlandsAppointments14Who’s moving where Deals News16The latest news from the dealmakers around the regionFastest 40 Shortlist 18East Midlands Business Link’s second Fastest 40 Awardstakes place on Thursday 26th February at Hotel Maiyangoin Leicester. Here, we take a look at the shortlistedindividuals and ask what makes them tick.2015 Business Resolutions26Out with the old, and in with new as 2014 draws to aclose. But what will the key business leaders in the regionbe looking to achieve in 2015? We found out.Businss Plan28As a sponsor of the East Midlands Fastest 40 and havingworked with many fast growing or high growthenterprises, Streets Chartered Accountants is very awareof the challenges that entrepreneurs or managers face inrunning and developing such businesses, says JamesPinchbeck, marketing partner.Deals Funding 30Funding for deals in 2015 can be found, but the rightstructure and team needs to be in place before buying orselling a business - that was the message from EastMidlands Business Link’s Dealmaker’s Breakfast.Breakfast Event32Around 70 business owners gathered at the new offices ofPKF Cooper Parry at East Midlands Airport for EastMidlands Business Link’s Demystifying the Cloud breakfastseminar.Coaching34The arrival of a new year inspires us all to start settingpersonal goals for the 12 months ahead, says Stuart Rossof High Growth.IT 37Here we take a look at the importance of securing yournetwork, as well as the key to making the most of therelationship with your service provider. So what do youneed to know and where is this rapidly evolving area of ITheading in the future?Marketing 40Recently, Greg Simpson from Press for Attention PR wasout at a networking function but his phone was constantlypinging texts, keeping him updated from a ceremonysomewhere in London...Dress Down Friday 42The lighter side of East Midlands office lifeSupporting Business Growth44What better example of supporting business growth thanthe recent Dragon’s Den style investor event which gaveLincolnshire businesses the chance to pitch for backing Business Scene 46One of Lincolnshire’s oldest golf clubs, Canwick Park GolfClub held their annual dinner, bringing together membersfor excellent company.AutoLink46For readers who want the ultimate Christmas present,there are some very tempting executive cars on themarket this season. Build quality, comfort and standardequipment are all now better than ever. If you spend hoursbehind the wheel you'll be grateful for the refinement themajority of these business-oriented saloons offer.Out of Office50All the leisure sector news from the last month442East Midlands Business Link www.eastmidlandsbusinesslink.co.uk37EditorSam Metcalfs.metcalf@blmgroup.co.ukAdvertisingLisa Muckle l.muckle@blmgroup.co.ukAccounts & SubscriptionsAngela Sharman, Dawn Cookaccounts@blmgroup.co.ukTel: (01472) 310301 Fax: (01472) 310311Design & ProductionGary Jorgensen, Mark Casson,Rachel Greenstudio@blmgroup.co.ukTel: (01472) 310304Fax: (01472) 310314E-Mail:eastmidlands@blmgroup.co.ukPublisherHaychart Ltd, t/a Business Link Magazine Group,Armstrong House, Armstrong Street, Grimsby, N.E. Lincs., DN31 2QE.All rights reserved. No part of this publicationmay be reproduced, transmitted, photocopied,recorded or otherwise without expresspermission of the copyright holder, for whichapplication should be addressed first to thepublisher. While every reasonable care is taken,neither the publisher nor its participating agentsaccept liability for loss or damage to prints,colour transparencies, negatives or othermaterial of whatever nature submitted to thispublication. The views expressed in thispublication are not necessarily the views of thoseheld by the publisher.@BLMEastMidlandsBLMEastMidlands5www.eastmidlandsbusinesslink.co.uk East MidlandsBusiness Link Cover photo:www.stutterstock.com/lightspringEast Midlands Business Link www.eastmidlandsbusinesslink.co.uk6Northants LEP prepares toturn its back on East MidlandsLocal Enterprise Partnerships in Buckinghamshire (BTV),Northamptonshire (NEP) and Oxfordshire (OxLEP) has responded to the Tri-County Combined Authority initiative proposed by Buckinghamshire,Northamptonshire and Oxfordshire County Councils, following its launch atSilverstone.John Markham and Adrian Shooter attended the event alongside the chiefexecutives of the three LEPs, to hear how the Local Authorities planned towork together more closely.Adrian Shooter, CBE, Chair of OxLEP said: “We as business-ledorganisations, with responsibility for economic growth within our areas arekeen to explore initiatives that help us to deliver our economic ambitions.We know that a high quality transport infrastructure and improvedconnectivity is key to unlocking growth and we will therefore be workingclosely with all of our Local Authority colleagues as their thinking develops.”John Markham, OBE, chair of NEP, said: “Our three Strategic EconomicPlans set out bold and ambitious growth plans for each of our Counties,which have already successfully levered in a total of £272.2m (£44.2 BTV,£119.5m Northamptonshire, £108.5m Oxfordshire) from Government andwill be spent on developing the infrastructure to deliver growth. This is ontop of the 87.9million euros that we will collectively be getting through ourEuropean Structural and Investment Fund (ESIF) Strategies. Our success todate demonstrates the case for the further devolution of funding to ourareas, as we understand the economy and how we can help our businessesto go further, faster.”Alex Pratt, OBE, chair of BTV added: “The combined authority initiativebetween Buckinghamshire, Northamptonshire and Oxfordshire has beendeveloped by the three County Local Authorities and we jointly welcomeany proposals which will help us to achieve our vision by acceleratinggrowth and enabling businesses to succeed, improve collaboration and theefficiency and effectiveness of our public services."We enjoy excellent working relationships and already collaborate onareas of mutual interest, including our respective Growth Hubs. All threeLEPs will continue to identify opportunities to increase this collaboration andcontinue to share our relative expertise."Adrian Shooter, CBE concluded by saying: “We look forward to exploringthe potential of combined authority working for the benefit of oureconomies and individual businesses."Crowdicity expands intoPolandCrowdicity, the Nottingham-based online ideas managementplatform provider, has opened a new Polish office.Crowdicity’s new office in Polands will be in Krakow. The firmoffers crowdsourcing services.Rob Wilmot, CEO and Co-founder of Crowdicity said:“Crowdicity is opening up a Polish tech hub to tap into thecountry’s extraordinary pool of coding talent. Poland has fastbecome a recognised force in the tech world and is consideredone of Europe’s fastest growing economies. Poland was the onlyEU country to not fall into recession in 2009 – thanks in part toits thriving tech scene and focus on innovative start-ups.“Crowdicity has brought a game changing way forbusinesses and organisations to unlock ideas and bring positivechange. For instance, the Mayor of Rio de Janeiro recently usedCrowdicity to ask the entire population what they wanted to seefrom the Olympic legacy. We’re looking for the most talenteddevelopers in Krakow to work on cloud-based software that’salready having a massive impact on society worldwide.”Polish software developer Tomasz Rychtyk will leadCrowdicity’s Krakow-based team. He said: “Poland’s tech sceneis booming and Crowdicity realises this. Having worked for thecompany in both in the UK and Poland, I’ve been a part of somereally innovative projects. With such a pool of talent, Polandcould well be on its way to becoming the next Silicon Valley.”Macildowie expands southEast Midlands-based recruitment consultancy Macildowie is expanding outside the region for the first time, with anew office in Milton Keynes.The new team of 12 will be based on Midsummer Boulevard, Central Milton Keynes, from January 2015.“The market in Milton Keynes provides a significant recruitment opportunity,” said James Calder, chief executive ofMacildowie.“We have had considerable success working with companies in Milton Keynes before, but to truly maximise theopportunity we feel that we need to have a physical base there. The team have been prepping this move for anumber of months now, and all the hard work behind the scenes means that we will hit the ground running with12consultants from the start of 2015.“As a business we have been working tirelessly during the economic downturn to create an environment where wecan react quickly to changes within the market. Our ambitious growth plans means we will be adding a further 14new heads before May 2015.”James Lawson and Arran Jaiswal, both associate directors at Macildowie will be heading up the team in MiltonKeynes.Jaiswal added: “We will initially be moving down with a team of 12, but given the success of our business modelacross other cities in the Midlands, I fully expect this the office to grow in numbers throughout the year.“I am excited to get started. Having worked at Macildowie for ten years, I know the importance of maintaining the existing companyculture in the new office. Last year we were fifth in The Times Top 100 Companies to Work For awards, which shows how importantthe wellbeing of the team is to Macildowie.”Macildowie currently has offices that cover Nottinghamshire, Leicestershire, Derbyshire and Northamptonshire.LATEST NEWSMorgan Tucker announces partnershipwith Lincoln UTCConsulting engineering firm Morgan Tucker has announced a partnership with LincolnUniversity Technical College (UTC) in a programme to seek out the engineers of the future.The firm has become an ‘employer-partner’ to the college, which means it will supportstudents at the college interested in a career in engineering to get their foot in the door of theindustry from an early age.Lincoln UTC provides 14 to 18-year-olds with the unique opportunity of combining core subjects, for example in maths and English, with highlyspecialised studies in engineering and science.Managing director at Morgan Tucker, Matthew Tucker, said the new partnership reflected the values at the core of his firm, which has its head office inNewark.He said: “At Morgan Tucker we are passionate about ensuring engineering is seen as an exciting and rewarding career for the next generation ofschool leavers, and we are keen to meet with and get to know as many would-be engineers as possible.“Our new partnership with Lincoln UTC means that this passion can be put in to action.”www.eastmidlandsbusinesslink.co.uk East Midlands Business Link 7LATEST NEWSBioscience incubator plans get greenlightPlans for a new life science incubator have taken a step forward this week with theapproval of planning permission for the scheme by Nottingham City Council.The planned five-storey, 50,000 sq ft building, next to the Biocity complex, would create upto 200 jobs.The new building will go through approval processes by the City Council beforeconstruction begins, which is anticipated to start in Spring 2015.The new incubator facility would be developed by Nottingham City Council with £6.5mfunding from the Local Growth Fund.Initial designs for the building have been developed by Willmott Dixon, whilst Nottinghampractice CPMG has been appointed as architects on the scheme.Nick Heath, operations director at Willmott Dixon in the East Midlands, said: “We arepleased that this project is moving forward.“The new building will feature a number of state-of-the-art biology and chemistrylaboratories in a range of sizes, as well as ancillary space for commercial lease to both start-up and as well as ancillary space for commercial lease to both start-up and existing small andmedium sized enterprises (SMEs) within the sector.”Hugh Avison, group director at CPMG, said: “Nottingham is already well known for itsscience expertise – being the home of Ibruprofen and the MRI scanner.“The area is highlighted for major future development as the Eastside Regeneration Zone;we are immensely proud to be designing the first building as part of this, which we are surewill act as a catalyst for further development.”Gleeds has been appointed as project and cost manager for the scheme. Anthony Cork,director for Gleeds in Nottingham, said: “We’re delighted the scheme got the green light fromthe planning committee, and that Nottingham is a step closer to securing anotherdevelopment that will encourage business and investment into the city.”Business confidencefalls in East MidsIt's not the message that businesses want to hearas they enter 2015, but according to the latest in aseries of influential surveys, business confidence isfalling in the East Midlands.The latest ICAEW/Grant Thornton UK BusinessConfidence Monitor (BCM) shows that businessconfidence in the East Midlands and now stands at+24.3 as economic uncertainty impacts on firms’plans for the year ahead.The survey shows that the BCM Confidence Indexfor the East Midlands stands at +24.3 down from+45.5 earlier in 2014. Confidence is now below the+37.7 reading for December 2013.Despite this, the survey shows thatunemployment levels are falling faster thananywhere outside London, which has boostedconsumer spending and domestic sales in the area.However, results from Q4 showed that exportgrowth in the region has slowed to 3.1 per cent overthe last twelve months adding to concerns over thestability of the Eurozone economy.And despite positive financial results, the surveyshowed that businesses in the region are not feelingpositive that this will continue, with less growthexpected across sales, workforce and turnover.Chris Frostwick, partner and practice leader atGrant Thornton in the East Midlands, said: "Thereare signs that cooler conditions are approaching.Although conditions in the East Midlands arecurrently much improved and confidence is stillrelatively high, businesses are starting to feeluncertain about their prospects for the year ahead.The outcome of the upcoming general election isadding to uncertainty amongst business leaders, asit has the potential to affect not only the shape ofour domestic future, but potentially also our placewithin the EU.”7LinkingbusinesstogetherEast Midlands Business Link has been bringing businesses together through itsonline pages and we’re now offering even more chances to network andcreate new relationships with a host of special events – and there are numerous sponsorship opportunities to help promote your brand!Round TablesBringing together leading names from local businesses, our round table events debate the latest hottopics. By sponsoring the event you can decide on the topic and help shape the guest list to ensurerelevance. The resultant debate will appear in our pages.Breakfast EventsEast Midlands Business Link's breakfast events present topical and incisive discussion. A panel ofexperts offer their views on business matters in front of an informed and interested audience –alongside plenty of opportunities to network! Sponsors of the event receive access to the delegate list as well as extensive pre- and post-event coverage.AwardsHighlighting the best of local business, there are myriad sponsorship opportunities atEast Midlands Business Link's awards evenings. Bringing together guests from across the region,sponsoring a category or even the entire event will ensure exceptional exposure for your business! These events are also a great place to entertain and welcome distinguished guests.Business Link is renowned as the voice of the East Midlands business scene. By partnering with us at these special events you can take advantage of our strong reputation and enjoy exceptional exposure for your brand!Connectwith us today to see what we can do for your business...s.metcalf@blmgroup.co.ukl.muckle@blmgroup.co.ukSchuh shop sold for £1.5mFHP, acting on behalf of a private investor, has bought the Schuh unit at 31-32 Long Row,Nottingham via the Acuitus November Auction.The 9,757 sq ft property is leased to Schuh until 23rd June 2016 at a rent of £167,500 perannum, and was brought for £1.5m.David Hargreaves of FHP said: “We know this property well, having originally acquired the unitfor Schuh and although their lease is close to an end, we are confident that if they did not renewtheir lease, the property would be readily relettable bearing in mind its prime location overlookingthe Market Square."We have recently let the former Pizza Hut unit two doors away at a rent of £155,000 per annum toFive Guys with a number of under-bidders, whilst the upper floors in due course will potentially providea development option for apartments/student accommodation.”FHP has been retained to manage the property.Litton reveals mixed-use M1 schemeLitton Property Group has announced plans to developa commercial property scheme alongside the M1motorway near East Midlands Airport.Proposals are being drawn up for a 3.9 acre site toinclude office, manufacturing, hotel and showroom usewith the development being adjacent to the M1. The sitealready has consent for new access from the Finger Farmroundabout in front of East Midlands Airport.A planning application is expected to be made in 2015.Litton Property Group, based in Bakewell in Derbyshire,has formed a joint venture with the land owner MotoHospitality, which is the UK’s largest operator of motorwayservices and already operates the nearby Donington ParkServices.Richard Squire, development director at Litton, said:“This is a rare opportunity for businesses to secure newproperty that will be seen by passing traffic on a busystretch of motorway and near one of the fastest growingregional airports for both freight and passengers. Welook forward to working collaboratively with ourpartners and all other stakeholders to deliver thisproject.”Pick Everard kicks off on£14m LoughboroughCollege schemeManagement, design and construction multi-disciplinaryconsultancy, Pick Everard, has started work on a £14.1mrefurbishment project at Loughborough College.The scheme will see the extensive refurbishment of thecollege’s multi-storey, six-floor A-Block – housing the sixth formcollege - which dates back to the 1960s.As well as being stripped out completely and refurbished, the building will be made far more energy efficient with improved lighting and will becomeopen plan. There will also be a new roof and replacement cladding to envelope the building.Pick Everard has been appointed as the project managers and quantity surveyors for the Leicestershire scheme.The new project follows the previous appointment of Pick Everard by the college to deliver a £15m Loughborough Arts Academy and Hub which wascompleted in September, 2014.Matt Hall, project manager for the scheme at Pick Everard, said: “We are thrilled to be re-appointed by the college to deliver another major scheme.“The refurbishment of the block will be another significant project for the college as it looks to maximise the use of the teaching block toaccommodate growing student numbers.“The work onsite involves the complete renewal of the whole of the building, apart from its main structural walls. It’s an extensive project with a newlay-out inside the building, new cladding and a new roof. “Amongst our main priorities will be keeping the site live. We have re-modelled other buildings on campus and introduced temporaryaccommodation so that teaching and learning will continue on site throughout the process."The work on the top three floors of the A-Block is due to be completed in September, 2015 and the remaining floors in October, 2015.COMMERCIAL PROPERTYwww.eastmidlandsbusinesslink.co.uk East Midlands Business Link 9Next >