As a bustling British seaport, Bristol is well known for its rich history of commodities trading, but over the centuries, the city’s reputation has expanded far beyond exporting wool and importing produce. These days, Bristol is largely bolstered by a thriving high-tech business scene. Companies across aerospace, defense and financial services have a notable presence in the city. Learn more about the companies shaping Bristol’s modern-day economy.
Top Companies in Bristol
- BAE Systems
- McCann
- Payaca
- Cepro
- Rolls-Royce
Top Companies in Bristol to Know
Reiss offers clothing for both children and adults that it calls both modern and timeless. The fashion house aims to offer attainable luxury collections. Its digital arm includes logistics, IT, finance, marketing and product teams. The company was founded in 1971 and has its Bristol office near Castle Park.
Operating in the defense and space manufacturing sectors, BAE Systems delivers products and services for air, land and naval forces, providing electronics, security and IT solutions to governments around the world. The company manufactures land vehicles, sea surface vessels and various military electronics. BAE Systems also offers cybersecurity solutions and engineering support services for space agencies and more.
Immersive Labs, a company that helps brands increase their resilience against cyber attacks, started in a Bristol shipping container. Since 2017, the company has grown to more than 300 employees, although its headquarters are still in Bristol. The main office now has unique amenities that include a candy wall, indoor scooters, a wellness room and a game room.
Cepro operates in the energy sector, helping homebuilders achieve net-zero carbon emissions on newly constructed houses. The company funds, builds and operates fully managed community microgrids. Its solution works to streamline financing and construction while managing customer participation and optimizing asset dispatch, in an effort to enable each energy community to be fully self-sustaining.
Ascent helps users maintain financial compliance through its platform, which is centered around “channels” from separate regulatory groups. Its platform includes AI that finds and holds the rules with which their client company has to comply. The company has its local offices in the Redcliffe area.
SmartBear offers software development teams its integrated hub to enable them to build, test, release and monitor software. Its solution hubs include its SmartBear Test Hub, SmartBear Insight Hub and SmartBear API Hub.
Volkswagen is headquartered in Wolfburg and has a Bristol location at Pioneer Park in Brislington. It is the largest carmaker in Europe with ten brands, operating in 114 production plants around the world. The company says it aims to create vehicles that are safe, intelligent, quiet and clean.
McCann specializes in advertising, helping brands fuel growth and leave lasting impacts on culture. The company founded McCann Worldgroup, a creative marketing company with a global reach. This network aims to equip marketers with strategic and creative services that help brands build their businesses while playing meaningful roles in people’s lives.
Payaca is a customer relationship management software provider. It works to help field service organizations connect with accounting and payment services through its mobile and web apps. Its offerings combine its CRM with job management, payments and analytics features to support businesses of all sizes.
Though a well-known luxury vehicle manufacturer, Rolls-Royce also delivers power and propulsion technologies for the aerospace and defense industries. It works to help its customers connect people, societies, cultures and economies. Rolls-Royce’s technology supports safety-critical applications for air, sea and land operations, helping governments equip their militaries with the power to protect.
