Small and medium-size businesses will be encouraged to get involved in the 2012 Olympics tomorrow with the start of a “business dating agency”.

Until now there has been some criticism that the biggest companies are winning all the main contracts for the main venues and then subcontracting out work to the small firms that already work for them. But tomorrow Sebastian Coe, chairman of the London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games, will announce a new online network, which will allow small companies to search for contracts themselves.

The firms will be able to fill in a form on the website expressing which contracts they would like to apply for and provide a short business profile. From this they can be shortlisted either by the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA), responsible for the building the venues, or the main contractors. ODA sources predict that the site could provide up to 75,000 “business opportunities” before 2012, worth £6 billion.

To date, about 500 contracts worth £1 billion have been awarded, There is evidence that the cost of some of the construction work has been pushed up because companies are wary of tendering under pressure of tight deadlines.

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