Hosted at NatWest Group’s London headquarters, the X-Forces Enterprise (XFE) Biennial Symposium 2025 convened leaders from Defence, Government, Business and Education to explore how enterprise transforms lives across the Armed Forces community from cadets taking first steps to acquire enterprise skills to start-ups and scale-ups.
A point of celebration: PJ Farr, a former infantryman and one of XFE’s very first cohort in 2013, now leads UK Connect, turning over £8m with 70+ employees. He had the room laughing as he recalled using a £1,500 Start Up Loan to buy a van, still parked on his driveway, to his wife’s dismay. That van, he said, is a daily reminder of 12 years of grit, ambition and momentum. XFE has funded almost £40million of government backed finance to the armed forces community and estimates to have empowered the creation of 11,000 jobs.
Cadets in Enterprise: Accredited, Ambitious and Celebrated
The day opened with the latest Cadets in Enterprise graduation, delivered through the Soldiering On Academy and for the first time accredited by Anglia Ruskin University. Reservists Wing Commander Amanda Curtis and SSI Sam Ross-Wilden both NatWest employees presented certificates, highlighting NatWest’s commitment to youth enterprise. “These young people represent the future of leadership, innovation and community impact,” said Julie Baker, Head of Strategic Partnerships, NatWest.
In a powerful show of support, Landmarc Solutions’ Managing Director, Mark Neill, offered every graduating cadet a guaranteed interview providing real-world experience in applications, CVs and interview skills. “Regardless of whether the cadets go into further education, jobs or looking at entrepreneurship, now or in the future, supporting young people to articulate their skills in a resume, online or a CV is confidence building and we as an organisation would be honoured to be able to support in this way’’ Mark Neill said.
Growth Outside of Service: Lived experience and Business Growth
A “Lived Experience” panel including David Tait, Emily Lunn, PJ Farr, Emily Witcher and Liam Gretton shared practical lessons from launching and growing businesses after service, highlighting leadership, resilience and purpose as decisive advantages. All their stories stood out for different reasons, a spouse who has moved and pivoted her business several times, a service leaver on the start of his journey, an army veteran now a multi-million turnover company, a navy veteran providing art, framing and ambition to bring this skill into the green economy, to a veteran led high impact real estate agent. All of them shared their experiences and gratitude to having a supportive network of business advice and support.
Policy, Partnership and Cross Government Stakeholders
The closing fireside conversation, chaired by XFE COO Martin Wing, brought together DWP, DBT and MOD leaders to focus on how national ambition becomes on-the-ground support. Topics included navigating benefits when moving into self-employment (DWP), going beyond start-up finance to unlock DBT’s wider partner ecosystem and export readiness, and deepening XFE’s near-decade partnership with MOD and CTP and further enhancing this with a new programme for spouses and partners launching 1 December 2025 following Armed Forces Covenant Trust Fund support.
“Policy counts when it lands where it should, with people. This panel demonstrated DWP, DBT and MOD pulling together so the Armed Forces community, service leavers, veterans, reservists, family members, spouses and partners can navigate clear routes to skills, funding and growth. That’s intent translated into impact.” Martin Wing, XFE COO said.
Keynote: scale with purpose
Keynote speaker Adam Casey, CEO of tmc3 and recent Soldiering On Award Scale-Up winner, reflected on RAF training foundations that shaped his company’s rapid multi-million-pound growth and global ambitions and connected with London Stock Exchange who were in attendance to explore further how the community engagement can be leveraged. A case in point that bringing the community in business together makes magic happen.
XFE perspective
“Enterprise isn’t just about business; it’s about economic empowerment,” said Ren Kapur MBE, XFE Founder & CEO. “From cadets to seasoned entrepreneurs, this community proves that where service meets success, society benefits and we need to ensure that we keep supporting individuals of all age groups”
What’s next?
Delivery, not declarations. On 1 Dec 2025 we go live with spouse and partner support; on 2 Dec the BBsSB group soft-launches OpEnterprise to knit DWP/DBT/MOD and corporate engagement routes into one clearer journey. We’ll scale Cadets in Enterprise in partnership with ARU accreditation, deepen mentoring and unlock supplier-diversity and growth readiness pilots with major corporates so service leavers, veterans, reservists and families move faster from ambition to action.
