Ignite 2026 opens £3.5m funding push for events SMEs
Allpoints, a growth consultancy and M&A advisory focused on the global events industry, has launched IBTM Ignite 2026 in partnership with IBTM World, offering up to £3.5 million in potential investment across a cohort of at least 30 startups and scaleups. The programme culminates in live pitch sessions at IBTM World in Barcelona from 17 to 19 November 2026, where a new Investors' Choice Award will recognise the most compelling business in the cohort.
The initiative arrives at what Allpoints describes as a period of structural change for the UK events sector. The industry contributes an estimated £68.7 billion to the national economy, with exhibitions alone accounting for £11.5 billion and 126,000 jobs, according to industry body data cited in the release. Yet access to growth capital for creative SMEs has remained persistently difficult, a gap the UK Government's Creative Industries Sector Plan has identified as a strategic priority, linking it to additional British Business Bank funding.
Beyond the tech startup template
A notable shift in the 2026 edition is a deliberate broadening of scope. Where many accelerator programmes restrict eligibility to software or technology businesses, Ignite explicitly welcomes agencies, production houses, specialist service providers and experience companies alongside tech firms. The goal, the company says, is to reflect the full creative ecosystem rather than privileging a narrow digital-first cohort.
Selected founders will receive investment-readiness training, access to mentors and industry leaders, and structured introductions to investors ahead of the Barcelona showcase. In its inaugural year, the programme drew more than 80 applicants and admitted 35.
Max Fellows, CEO and Founder of Allpoints, framed the rationale in direct terms: "The industry is going through a real transition right now, succession, consolidation, M&A, changing buying behaviour and new tech are all reshaping how creative and events-based SME businesses operate. At the same time, a new generation of entrepreneurs is coming through. We don't want to simply watch that happen, we want to help shape and nurture it."
The convergence angle: M&A pressure meets generational transfer
The Ignite programme sits at the intersection of two forces that Disrupts readers will recognise across multiple sectors. First, AI and automation are compressing the value proposition of labour-intensive creative businesses, pushing owners to reconsider their strategic options sooner than planned. Second, the UK's broader SME succession wave, visible in manufacturing, professional services and now hospitality, is generating a supply of assets at exactly the moment when deal-ready buyers and growth capital are concentrating in fewer hands.
For investors, the events sector's structural dynamics mirror patterns already playing out in retail and logistics: digital-native challengers are capturing share from incumbents who underinvested in technology during a prolonged period of strong post-pandemic demand. The £3.5 million headline figure across the cohort is modest by venture standards, but the strategic value of the IBTM World platform, which draws thousands of buyers and suppliers to Barcelona annually, may matter more to early-stage businesses than the cheque size alone.
The wider creative-economy capital gap also has a policy dimension. With the British Business Bank explicitly tasked to address the shortfall and the government's sector plan already published, programmes like Ignite occupy an increasingly important intermediary role: translating national ambition into sector-specific deal flow that institutional capital can act on. Whether the events industry can attract the kind of cross-sector interest, from hospitality tech funds, media-adjacent investors, or sovereign-backed tourism mandates, that would meaningfully scale that £3.5 million ceiling is the question the Barcelona pitches will begin to answer.