Management: business succession in the UK

Name: Management business succession in the UK
Creator: ExitRadar
License: https://www.exitradar.co.uk/terms

23,333 UK management companies (37.2%) have a director aged 60 or over.

4.8 points above the all-trades average of 32.4%.

Companies measured62,713

Director aged 60+23,333

Exposure rate37.2%

Companies House register·Measured base 3,631,842·Data as at 11 October 2026·Full methodology

62,713

Companies measured

23,333

With a director 60+

10,363

With a director 70+

37.2%

Exposure rate

Of the 23,333 with a director over 60, 1,306 score 50 or higher on business quality. That figure is an output of our own scoring model, not a Companies House figure. How we score it.

Management by region

Region	Companies	60+	Rate
South West	4,361	2,210	50.7%
South East	8,718	3,879	44.5%
Northern Ireland	869	384	44.2%
East of England	6,279	2,528	40.3%
Wales	1,490	583	39.1%
North East	1,434	536	37.4%
Yorkshire & The Humber	3,414	1,215	35.6%
Scotland	2,013	708	35.2%
North West	5,923	2,068	34.9%
East Midlands	3,096	1,015	32.8%
London	20,576	6,748	32.8%
West Midlands	4,504	1,440	32%

Combinations with fewer than 250 measured companies are not listed separately. They are still counted in every total on this page.

Next step

This page counts director ages across the whole register. If you are looking to buy rather than to research, our Property pages go further: we score each company on business quality and exit timing, and shortlist the ones worth approaching.

See UK Property →

Part of the UK Business Succession Index.

Cite this page

These figures are free to quote and reproduce, including in commercial work, with attribution to ExitRadar and a link to this page.

ExitRadar, "Management: business succession in the UK", UK Business Succession Index, 11 October 2026. https://www.exitradar.co.uk/succession/prop-management/

Need a cut that is not published here, such as a different trade grouping, a finer geography or the underlying distribution? Get in touch and we will usually provide it. Methodology.

Method. Figures cover the 3,631,842 active UK companies where Companies House records an age bracket for at least one serving director (94.0% of the 3,863,328 companies on the active register). A company counts as succession-exposed when its oldest serving director is 60 or over. We do not use the board average, which would hide a 70-year-old founder sitting alongside younger co-directors. The business-quality figure covers only the subset our model assesses; see the methodology for why that is far smaller than the number with filed accounts. Data as at 11 October 2026; updated quarterly, next update January 2027. Full methodology.