The attitude of some people to the Scottish National Investment Bank misses the whole point, writes Business Editor Ian McConnell.

There has been lots of water under the bridge since the Scottish National Investment Bank opened for business in November 2020.

SNIB reached a milestone this week, with a £10 million investment in Inverness-based Aurora Energy Services taking the total amount of capital it has committed in Scottish businesses and projects to more than £1 billion. 

As you would probably expect given the goldfish-bowl nature of the Scottish political scene, and the prevalence of others with ideological axes to grind, negativity towards SNIB has demoralisingly been the default position for many.

Detractors have seemed determined to get their monocles on, or magnifying glasses out, to scrutinise the track record and accounts of SNIB in some fairly concerted efforts to find fault.

And where they have detected what they perceive to be chinks in the armour, or indeed where SNIB has sustained sometimes significant losses on some of its investments, their glee has been almost palpable.

Of course, SNIB has sustained some major losses in its funding activities, notably in recent months on Glasgow-based M Squared Lasers. And the fall of pioneering Scottish space sector company Orbex into administration this month has been further bad news for SNIB, which backed this orbital launch services company significantly.

However, the simple fact of the matter is that the activities of SNIB, by their very nature, entail risk. And we should not ignore the employment provided by companies that are backed but ultimately fail and the broader impact of these businesses where they have, for example, helped cultivate progress in a particular field or led to other enterprises being formed.

What is more, SNIB is often providing funding to businesses in no small part because such finance is unavailable or difficult to obtain from other sources. And the activities of these enterprises have to chime with the institution’s “missions”.

SNIB describes itself as “an impact investor…focused on delivering both commercial returns and tangible benefits that align with........

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