Santander Corporate & Commercial has financed around £2 million in growth capital funding and working capital facilities to Cardiff, Wales based Forward Waste Management (FWM). The Welsh waste and recycling firm, which offers services specifically for the manufacturing sector, will use the funding to help develop its regional waste collection and processing facilities extending from South Wales to the West Midlands. Established in 2006, FWM provides an end-to-end service to UK manufacturers, including the management of hazardous waste materials. With a substantial increase in environmental regulation over the past decade, FWM said that it has expanded significantly as the demands on its clients have grownenabling it to capitalise by advising clients on their total waste management strategy via a single point of contact. The firm’s current clients include British Airways, Ricardo, Federal Mogul, Sony and Actavis. The Growth Capital funding from Santander is being used in particular to fund FWM’s operations in the West Midlands as the business develops a growing customer base in the region. Santander’s Growth Capital loans are targeted at businesses with annual turnovers of up to £50 million which have a demonstrated history of high year-on-year growth in turnover, profit or employment.  The facility is part of the bank’s Breakthrough support programme, which is aimed at fast-growth, ambitious businesses and includes funded overseas trade missions, Masterclass events and also provides graduate interns to SMEs. FWM added said that it also incorporates its own waste handling equipment division, Enviroquip, manufacturing and refurbishing a wide range of machinery including waste compactors, balers and containers. Lyndon Ward, managing director of Forward Waste Management Ltd, said: “We are a dynamic business operating in growth driven by the increasingly significant waste and recycling regulatory and compliance requirements for our customer base.” Peter Abel, Director, Growth Capital, Santander Corporate & Commercial added: “This is a business we have known and tracked for a while….  They operate in a sector with exciting opportunities.”