LONDON, Nov. 19 (Xinhua) -- The number of business births in Britain in 2018 remained broadly similar to the previous year, but over the same period there were fewer businesses dying, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) revealed Tuesday.
Data showed 381,000 businesses were launched in 2018, broadly similar to 2017, with birth rate of 12.9 percent in 2018 compared with 13.1 percent in 2017.
The number of British business deaths decreased from 362,000 to 336,000 between 2017 and 2018, a death rate of 11.4 percent compared with 12.4 percent in 2017.
There were around 2.94 million active businesses in Britain during 2018, an increase of 14,000 on 2017. The professional, scientific and technical sector, with 542,000 businesses, topped the chart as the biggest group, followed by the construction industry which had 389,000 businesses operating.
ONS said London, home to 613,000 active businesses, had the highest business birth rate at 15.9 percent in 2018, while Northwest England saw the highest business death rate at 13.5 percent.
The main industry impacting business births in London was retail, with mail order retail houses or internet retail making up the largest percentage of the new businesses.
