UK Government puts £30m into funding university spinout support hubs in Midlands, North East, Merseyside, and East Anglia

The UK government has announced £30m in funding for university spinouts, to be managed by four partner regional research clusters covering Merseyside, East Anglia, the Midlands, and Northeast England.

The Government Office for Technology Transfer will be supporting the new push with two new guides, one on IP commercialisation and the second on the practicalities of using the spinout route.

The Government announcement says that UK innovators face “red tape, talent shortages and a lack of access to funding” which is preventing them “from turning their ideas into viable growing businesses.”

The £30 million funding will support a taskforce of world-leading universities and industry experts across the four locations to support efforts to incubate and spin out new companies and create a suitable environment for innovators and entrepreneurs to build new companies on the back of new ideas.

Announcing the news on a visit to Aston University, Science Minister, Lord Vallance said:

“The UK is home to some of the world’s best universities, and we have deep strengths from life sciences to cutting-edge fields like quantum and engineering biology. But we can and must do more to unlock scientific research’s vast economic potential, and to help our innovators world-leading public sector labs turn brilliant ideas into businesses that attract investment and sustain jobs. The funding and guidance we are announcing today will reinforce those efforts – supporting our mission to grow the economy as part of the Plan for Change.”

The four hubs which will be receiving funding from Research England are:

Strategic Commercialisation Ecosystem North East (SCENE)

Based in the North East, SCENE is receiving £8m+ over five years to strengthen and expand the region’s ecosystem, engaging businesses, sector bodies, Catapults and investors more actively in commercialising university research.

Forging ahead/Forging beyond

Based in the Midlands, this hub is getting almost £10m over five years to address the talent, expertise and skills gaps in the Midlands by creating a Talent Pool, inward investment champions and innovation networks. The project will particularly target Heath, Advanced Manufacturing, Net Zero, and Creative & Digital sectors. 

Biologics Regional Innovation and Technology Ecosystem (BRITE)

BRITE, based in Merseyside, will get £4m+ over three years to establish a sustainable life sciences ecosystem in the Liverpool City Region (LCR), focused on developing treatments like vaccines, addressing gaps in the development of products and materials from living cells or their components, and scaling-up and commercialisation of resulting products and technologies.

Agri-Tech Commercialisation Ecosystems (ACE)

ACE, based in Lincolnshire and East Anglia, will get almost £5 million over three years to establish a world-leading, self-sustaining Agri-Tech research commercialisation cluster in Greater Lincolnshire and East Anglia, with support from Barclays Eagle Labs, Greater Lincolnshire LEP, New Anglia LEP, and Cambridgeshire & Peterborough Combined Authority, plus commercial partners.

The 27 universities involved in the four projects are:

Project: Strategic Commercialisation Ecosystem North East (SCENE)

• Durham University (Lead)

• Newcastle University

• Northumbria University

• University of Sunderland

• Teesside University

Project: Forging ahead/ Forging beyond

• Loughborough University (Lead)

• Aston University

• University of Birmingham

• Birmingham City University

• Cranfield University

• Coventry University

• Derby University

• De Montfort University

• Keele University

• Leicester University

• University of Lincoln

• University of Nottingham

• Nottingham Trent University

• University of Warwick

• University of Wolverhampton

Project: Biologics Regional Innovation and Technology Ecosystems (BRITE)

• Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine (Lead)

• University of Liverpool

• Liverpool John Moores University

• Edge Hill University

Project: Agri-tech commercialisation ecosystems (ACE)

• University of Lincoln (Lead)

• University of Cambridge

• University of East Anglia