FT Adviser – The scale-up shift: What’s changing with EIS?

Parkwalk CEO Moray Wright features in FT Adviser, discussing the upcoming expansion of the Enterprise Investment Scheme (EIS) and what it means for advisers, investors and UK scale‑ups.

From April, the Enterprise Investment Scheme will be significantly expanded. It will shift from being primarily a seed and early stage funding tool to a credible source of growth capital for scale ups. Both the annual investment cap and the lifetime funding limit will double, meaning standard companies can raise up to £24m through EIS in total, and up to £40m for “knowledge intensive” businesses developing proprietary intellectual property. This is a real step up in scale that will change how advisers, investors and entrepreneurs use the scheme.

For early-stage firms, the higher limits are transformative. Take a life sciences spinout from a leading university, developing technology with the potential to change treatment for a major disease. The journey from lab to market is long and capital intensive, typically involving multiple funding rounds over many years.

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