CREATE
Creating Businesses, Creating Employers
Frontier Report
CONNECT
The Missing Middle
Building stronger Welsh SME ecosystems
Independent firms can achieve more when they can draw on capabilities, relationships and markets that would be uneconomic to build alone.
The proposition
Help independent firms borrow scale through relationships.
CONNECT examines the layer between individual businesses and the wider economy: supplier relationships, consortia, shared facilities and collaborative innovation. The objective is useful commercial relationships, not networking activity for its own sake. Relationships with major organisations should strengthen SMEs’ capabilities and widen their choices.
What the publication argues
01
Make SME-to-SME collaboration an explicit economic-development objective.
02
Support shared capability, joint market access and relationships that change what firms can do.
03
Assess major-customer relationships by the capabilities and independence they leave behind.
Evidence and examples
Italy’s network-contract framework provides an example of formal collaboration between independently owned firms. The report distinguishes the transferable lessons from the legal arrangements that would require UK action.
The full publication sets out the evidence, qualifications, recommendations and source references.
Citing this publication
Husain, S. (2026). CONNECT — The Missing Middle. Frontier Report, September.
Read the series
The Framework Briefing introduces the argument; the Reports examine each part in depth.
Discuss the implications for your organisation
For enquiries about this publication, speaking or advisory work, contact Frontier. You can also explore our services.