Autumn Budget 2026: building creative businesses, not just creating content

Backing founders and growth

The new Founders’ Relief is one of the more eye-catching announcements. From 6 April 2027, qualifying founders and significant early investors in high-growth, innovative UK companies will be able to benefit from a 10% Capital Gains Tax rate on up to £10 million of lifetime gains. The detailed qualifying conditions remain subject to consultation. At the same time, the lifetime limit for Business Asset Disposal Relief (BADR) will fall from £1 million to £500,000. For founders, that creates a more nuanced picture than the headline announcement might suggest.

The detail of who qualifies for Founders’ Relief will be particularly important. Media and entertainment businesses can build substantial value around IP, catalogues, formats, brands and audiences without necessarily fitting a conventional model of a high-growth technology business.

If the objective is to encourage entrepreneurs to build and retain valuable businesses in the UK, the regime needs to recognise the different ways in which those businesses create and grow value.

Access to capital matters too. The Government is increasing the British Business Bank’s financial capacity by £5 billion, including £1.4 billion of new investment commitments in commercial equity and £450 million for a new venture debt product. More growth capital may give founders greater scope to scale rather than sell but inevitably brings questions of ownership and control. For creative businesses sitting on potentially valuable IP, those decisions can have long-term consequences.

From creating IP to owning it

For many creative businesses, creating the IP is only the start.

A successful piece of content, catalogue, format or brand can lead to licensing, merchandising, live entertainment, brand partnerships, international expansion and other opportunities. Businesses that exploit those opportunities successfully can build significant value beyond the original asset.

The Government has identified the creative industries as one of the UK’s growth-driving sectors. The Budget highlights over £75 million in investment in the CoSTAR network of creative-technology research and development facilities, alongside £20 million from the Growth Mission Fund towards the redevelopment of Liverpool’s Littlewoods site as a creative campus for film, television, gaming, immersive technology and digital screen businesses. That support is welcome. However, it also highlights a broader point.

Encouraging films, television, music, games and other content to be created in the UK is important. The bigger prize is for more of the businesses and IP behind that content to be owned, developed and grown here as well.

That requires more than production incentives. Creative businesses need access to investment, the ability to retain key people and an environment in which they can acquire, commercialise and grow the value of their IP.

The UK’s creative economy should ultimately be judged not just by what is made here but by how much of the long-term value generated by that creativity remains here too.

People and equity

That makes the Budget’s changes to employee equity particularly relevant.

From 6 April 2027, Enterprise Management Incentives 2 (EMI2), the expanded scheme formerly known as CSOP, will allow employees to hold up to £120,000 of tax-advantaged options, double the existing £60,000 limit. The exercise period will also be extended to 15 years. For growing media and entertainment businesses, that could be significant.

Equity can help founders attract and retain key people while giving those individuals the opportunity to participate in the value they help to create. It is not simply a tax incentive. Used properly, it is part of the corporate toolkit for building a business.

If the Government wants more high-growth businesses to remain and scale in the UK, they need to be able to compete for talent as well as capital.

The Government also intends to legislate so that non-compete clauses are no longer a barrier to hiring by promising start-ups and scale-ups, while recognising the need to protect intellectual property.

For media and entertainment businesses, where relationships, confidential information and IP can themselves form an important part of enterprise value, getting that balance right will matter.

What does this mean for transactions?

A media or entertainment business with valuable IP, an established brand, a strong catalogue or a loyal audience will continue to attract interest from strategic buyers and financial investors.

The Budget does not fundamentally change that. It may, however, change some of the calculations around a transaction.

The combination of the new Founders’ Relief and the reduction in the BADR lifetime limit may affect shareholder expectations and, depending on eligibility, the timing and structure of an exit. Increased access to growth capital could pull in the other direction, giving some founders the option to raise capital and continue growing rather than sell. Those considerations may also feed into decisions about reinvestment, rollover equity and how much value founders and management choose to realise on a transaction.

For boards, shareholders and in-house legal teams, the practical point is to consider those issues early. Decisions about investment, ownership, incentives and exit are increasingly connected, particularly where the underlying value of the business sits in IP.

The bigger prize

There is much in the Budget for founders and growing businesses to welcome.

However, the success of the UK’s creative industries should not be judged simply by how much content is produced here.

The bigger prize is building businesses that own valuable IP, attract investment, grow internationally and continue to generate value from their rights and audiences.

The UK has proved that it can be a world-class place to create content. The real test of these measures will be whether they help turn that creative success into more valuable businesses and IP that are built, owned and grown here too.