THE WEST MIDLANDS BPFS OPPORTUNITY

Technology-let innovation is fundamental to f the key BPFS sector to drive regional growth across Birmingham and the West Midlands.

THE BPFS OPPORTUNITY

With 343,000 professionals working for over 53,000 companies, the West Midlands is home to the largest Business, Professional and Financial Services (BPFS) sector outside of London. Birmingham has the highest concentration of employment in the Financial and Professional Services sector of any regional city and is home to all 4 of the Big Four.

The region also has an important and credible traditional financial services concentration, including major global investors such a HSBC, Goldman Sachs and  Deutsche Bank.

Skills and locations are still some of the major drivers for investment location in this sector, the West Midlands can deliver on all of this as the region produces a higher volume of computing and software graduates than any other regions outside of London including Software Developers, Technical Engineers and Data Analysts.

Building upon these attributes, the region is a hotbed for innovation with a growing ProfTech ecosystem supported by SuperTech and World Class universities.

Internationally ranked business schools at the Universities of Birmingham, Warwick and Aston, are part of an elite group holding the ’triple-crown’ MBA accreditation. In addition, Warwick Business School (which is becoming renowned globally for its expertise in FinTech, AI, Blockchain and Crypto) was recently named second most influential business school in the world (after Harvard).

Recognised as a leading cluster organisation by the WMCA and working across the ecosystem with industry, academia, other cluster organisations such as Tech WM and alongside innovation bodies, such as the Connected Places Catapult, our combined strength allows us to continue to attract even more attention to deliver technology-led innovation growth for the next generation of business, professional and financial services in the region.

IMPACT OF TECH IN THE WM BPFS SECTOR

Our 2023 impact report looked at how technology was supercharging next-generation services in the West Midlands.

Key findings include

  • Our region is on track to achieve £1bn in economic output in the sector.

  • Our FinTech workforce is 11,000+ people

  • 3,000 people were employed in WM LawTech and PropTech sector.

In 2024, in collaboration with Whitecap Consulting, we published a roadmap for the growth of the ProfTech sector, covering FinTech, LawTech and PropTech.

We forecast that ProfTech could add 4,600 jobs and £330m to the GVA of the region over the next decade, which would mean the sector was adding over 1.5bn to the WM economy each year by 2033.

Our innovation roadmap was designed around the themes of productivity; open data; sustainability; inclusion and wellness. Activities across these will drive growth across regional strengths like specialist lending, payments, wealth management, motor finance, property development transactions and provision of legal services.

SUPERTECH ON A PAGE

This diagram outlines our economic starting point, the ecosystem we’re strengthening, and the partners enabling progress. It shows how targeted programmes will drive technology-led innovation where it matters, to deliver measurable, long-term impact for our regional economy.

CHAMPIONING THE WEST MIDLANDS

Located in the heart of the United Kingdom – and home to 4.7m people – the West Midlands is one of Europe’s most dynamic, forward-looking and ambitious metropolitan regions. It’s also home to one of Europe’s youngest (and most culturally diverse) populations, and a place with a proud tradition of openness and tolerance.

But despite being less than 1.5 hours away from London, being directly connected to 400 global destinations by air, and with 90% of the UK population accessible within a four-hour drive, the West Midlands is still a very affordable, flexible and spacious location. for open innovation. 

The West Midlands Growth Company is the West Midlands region's investment promotion and destination management organisation. We work closely with them to deliver against our roadmap for the BPFS sector.