To ask the Minister for the Economy for his assessment of the potential to provide additional support to help small businesses and micro-businesses with digital transformation.

The £7.5m Digital Transformation Flexible Fund, supported under the Executive’s Complementary Fund, was launched in November 2023 to help SMEs overcome the barriers and challenges in developing their digital transformation plans.

The Fund gives micro, small and medium sized businesses the opportunity to improve their resilience, develop new digital capabilities and drive-up levels of digital engagement and innovation. This in turn will help drive productivity and competitiveness, delivering tangible benefits for the business itself, and for the wider economy. Three calls have already taken place resulting in 169 offers of support being made, with a further four calls planned.

Invest NI also continues to provide advice and financial support through existing support mechanisms to help increase adoption of digitalisation within export focused businesses across the North of Ireland.