Member Article

Digital start-ups offered specialist help

A North East IT company is offering financial assistance to digital entrepreneurs looking to get their businesses off the ground. MC Ware in Stokesley is looking to provide venture capital for start-up businesses in the region that are developing e-commerce or business applications.

The idea is the brainchild of MC Ware’s managing director, Jonathan Wheatley, who set up his company ten years ago thanks to venture capital investment.

Jonathan decided to establish the venture capital scheme after realising that more specialist help was needed to help fledgling digital entrepreneurs who might find it difficult to find knowledgeable support in the current economic climate. Jonathan Wheatley is a chartered member of the British Computer Society, a member of the Society for Computers and Law, a member of the Fraud Advisory Panel and a qualified ‘ethical hacker’.

Jonathan said: “I am passionate about supporting new digital companies but, because of the tough economic conditions we’re forced to work in, financing a new business is becoming increasingly difficult.

“We plan to offer a local, more approachable solution to digital entrepreneurs and, having started out in the same way myself, I fully understand the demands of a new IT-based company. We are sure that there is a hotbed of emerging talent in the area, with fresh ideas and systems, which needs that extra help to take their products into the marketplace. “We often work with people who have developed systems simply to make their own working life easier and these solutions can often be introduced to similar markets.”

Anyone interested in discussing options further should contact Sharon West at Sharon@mcware.co.uk.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .