Alcumus Presents to MPs and Lords on How Government Can Support Welsh Companies

Our CEO, Alyn Franklin and Helen Jones, COO Enterprise, had the opportunity recently to meet virtually with the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Wales in the World.

Share this story

Written by: Alcumus
24th February

Our Chief Executive Officer, Alyn Franklin and Helen Jones, Chief Operating Officer, Enterprise, had the opportunity recently to meet virtually with the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Wales in the World.
 
The APPG was created last year to provide a forum for MPs and Lords to raise the profile of Wales in Westminster and on the international stage, and to consider ideas to support the development of Wales.
 
During the meeting, Alyn and Helen provided the APPG with a briefing on our experience expanding the Alcumus business internationally and talked through some of the challenges that many large employers in Wales face when expanding their business.
 
Speaking to the group and drawing on his own business experience, Alyn said: “It’s easy to think [as a company] you’ve got to do it all yourself. But there’s a lot of help out there. A lot of complexities can be dealt with by professionals. If you can unlock the inertia around expansion you can learn a tremendous amount by working through the process, face into it, get the right support and you’ll find your way. Welsh companies need to be brave and think we’re good enough to compete on the international stage.”
 
The session also provided an opportunity to talk about Government support to make sure that Wales is an accessible, attractive place for professionals to live and operate in. This focused on the availability of talent when hiring locally, a greater investment on increasing highly skilled STEM graduates at Welsh universities and the importance of better domestic and international transport links.
 
Helen Jones said: “We need to think about how Wales is positioned internationally to encourage the best talent to come and live and work and set up businesses here. If we are ambitious, there are real opportunities we could take with legislation to encourage entrepreneurial people to come and live in the region and grow their businesses.”
 
Participants in the discussion included Dr Jamie Wallis, Conservative MP for Bridgend; Chris Elmore, Labour MP for Ogmore; and Conservative Peer Lord Davies of Gower. Labour MP Alex Davies-Jones, whose constituency includes Alcumus’s headquarters in Nantgarw, was also in attendance.
 
Following the meeting, Alcumus will be writing to the MPs and Lords in the Group with a more detailed outline of their views on what more the Government can do to encourage Welsh businesses to take the next step in expanding internationally.