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industry when HSBC Amanah was established in 1998, but it has been gathering tremendous momentum since then. In key Muslim markets, the numbers speak for themselves. In Saudi Arabia, 95% of new consumer lending is now Islamic. In UAE, 30% of retail banking has turned Islamic in a few years. Bahrain has emerged as a hub of this industry. In Malaysia, more than half the Ringitt bonds that were issued last year were structured according to shariah. (Naser, 1997)

The growing Muslim population in G10 countries will increase for demand Islamic financial products. By 2015, it has been projected that 1 in every 4 graduates in London will be a Muslim (Khan, 2007). Islamic finance has gained acceptability in Muslim minority countries. In the continuation of that, issuance of first Islamic securities Eurosukuk by Saxony, Germany has taken place. Banks like HSBC and Lloyds TSB have introduced Islamic shariah compliant banking solutions. They started to recognise, being a relatively new idea, Islamic banking has the potential for attracting new customers and consequently enhancing a bank's market share. The Islamic Bank of Britain started its business in the UK in 2004. However, in the countries where Muslims are minorities, it is not possible to sustain the competitive advantage of the Islamic finance just by attracting Muslim customers.

In the United Kingdom, the total amount of Muslims only account to less than 3% of the total population. (National Statistics Online, 2005) A financial industry cannot realistically rely on 3% of population for its growth. It is going to reach its saturation point very soon. For this reason, Islamic financial organisations need to start looking outside the Muslim customers to expand their business. The Islamic finance has a huge potential in the developed world where the non-Muslim countries hold the majority of the world's resources. In an article, Karen Lane (2006) of the Wall Street Journal described how a Texas-based energy firm East Cameron Partners wanted to raise cash in 2006, it turned not to banks or the domestic bond market, but to the Middle East. The result was the first bond backed by U.S. assets that adheres to Islamic laws. In order to sustain competitiveness and to reach the economies of scale, the Islamic financial companies need to start attracting non-Muslim customers in Britain as well.

The financial organisations providing the Islamic financial solutions need to raise awareness about the existence of the products based on Islamic finance. They need to highlight the benefits of the products and need to make their product as competitive as possible so that they become attractive to the conventional banks' customers. One problem with attracting non-Muslim customers would be their lack of understanding about the existent of Islamic Finance. Now, there are again couple of problems about this. Although UK is a secular country, the attachment of a financial package to a certain religious group may hinder its development into non-Muslim market. Another impending question is whether the current bosses of the Islamic financial organisations are actively trying to attract non-Muslim customers in UK.

This research aims to explore the above issues and to prescribe some sort of direction as to how the financial packages based on Islamic shariah can be made more attractive to the customers of the conventional banking systems. The research also aims