CLUSTER NEWS – April 2025
Work has been ongoing to develop a Narrative for HealthTech in the West Midlands since the roundtable we held in February.
The current, near-final, draft of the Narrative is constructed around four strengths:
- Digital connectivity (in all its senses)
- Innovation ingrained
- Unrivalled Collaboration
- Proven Track Record.
In summing up these strengths, the suggested Key Words for promotion of our sector are: Connect – Innovate – Collaborate – Achieve
A last round of inviting comments will be completed during May 2025 and then the Narrative will be published as a high quality document and made available to all who are interested.
If you want any further information about the Narrative at this stage, get in touch now with David Kidney: david@wmhtc.co.uk
CLUSTER’S EVENTS
We completed the Kick Start for HealthTech sessions with the first cohort of innovators and entrepreneurs and submitted an evaluation report to the funders. We intend to seek funding for a successor programme, provisionally entitled Gateway to HealthTech Innovation, for 2025-26.
I attended the Future Skills and Economy Thematic Panel meeting at UCB on 30th April.
Health Innovation West Midlands has a regional Medicines and the Environment Network meeting on the subject of Reducing Medicines Waste on 8th May 2025, 12pm – 1pm Online.
The next meeting of our Board of directors, which I shall chair, will take place on 20th May.
The West Midlands Investment Zone stakeholders will be meeting again on 29th May and I shall attend, representing WMHTC.
Funding Opportunities
1. Create Growth Programme
DCMS’ Create Growth Programme Competition 4: small projects offers UK registered micro, small and medium enterprises in the creative sector can apply for a share of up to £8 million for innovation projects to grow their business. We increasingly collaborate with Create Central on cross-sector creative/HealthTech business development. This funding is from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS).
The closing date for bids is Thursday 29 May 2025 11:00am
You can view the details here.
2. Decarbonisation Net Zero Programme
The Business Energy Advice Service (BEAS) pilot programme has been extended to run for another year across the West Midlands region. It is designed to help businesses save money and drive growth by providing free energy assessments and 50% match-funded grants.
As well as the area of the WM Combined Authority, the Service is available in Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent, Warwickshire, Worcestershire and The Marches (Herefordshire, Shropshire, Telford and Wrekin).
The BEAS programme can help your business save energy, reduce production costs and lower carbon emissions by funding a variety of practical energy efficiency measures.
See Business Growth WM’s website for more information and how to apply for a free energy assessment.
3. WM Health Technologies Innovation Accelerator
The flagship West Midlands Innovation Accelerator is getting a £10 million funding boost to support even more of the region’s innovative businesses, researchers and entrepreneurs to grow the economy.
The West Midlands is one of just three areas of the country to share £30million of new innovation funding from the Government to provide even more expert advice and grants to help commercialise new and emerging products and technologies.
The Innovation Accelerator, managed by the West Midlands Combined Authority, has already supported more than 700 businesses, helping them to secure £70 million of additional investment and create and secure hundreds of local jobs.
4. Facilities access for bioscience partnerships
A share of £2M is available to support UK businesses in accessing and benefitting from Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) skills, capabilities and facilities to find solutions to industrially relevant challenges.
There is an EOI application process first, which requires companies to submit a ‘challenge statement’ describing your problem. You do not need an academic partner at the EOI stage, but it is required for the full application stage.
The full economic cost (FEC) of your project can be up to £200,000. Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) and STFC will cover 100% of the facility costs, and 80% of the FEC of the academic component.
Closing date: 05 June 2025, 4pm.
5. Contract for Innovation: dementia assessments
This is a Contracts for Innovation competition funded by Innovate UK.
This competition is a demonstrator and aims to accelerate innovation in dementia based digital cognitive assessments (DCA). High maturity DCA innovations will be deployed and assessed as part of the READ-OUT (REAl-world Dementia OUTcomes) blood based biomarker study and feed into the Davos Alzheimer’s Collaborative System Preparedness project. The University of Oxford will support and facilitate the real world use of the DCA test at READ-OUT clinical sites.
Up to £600k can be awarded and only £1.2M is available, so there will be few successful bidders.
Closing date: 14 May 2025, 11am.
6. Innovation loans – future economy
UK registered businesses can apply for loans for innovative projects with strong commercial potential to significantly improve the UK economy. This is a competitive lending fund of £25 million in loans to micro, small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs). Innovate UK innovation loans are for highly innovative late stage research and development (R&D) projects with the best potential for the future. There must be a clear route to commercialisation and economic impact.
Your project must lead to innovative new products, processes or services that are significantly ahead of others currently available, or propose an innovative use of existing products, processes or services. It can also involve a new or innovative business model.
Closing date: Round 20 will close on 07 May, 11am.
HEALTH TECHNOLOGIES SECTOR NEWS
1. Government announces £600m investment in medical research
UK Prime Minister Kier Starmer has announced action to accelerate the discovery of life-saving drugs, improve patient care and advance UK medical research.
The Government and the Wellcome Trust will invest up to £600 million to create a new Health Data Research Service.
This aims to transform the access to NHS data by providing a secure single access point to national-scale data sets, slashing red tape for researchers.
According to the Department for Health and Social Care (DHSC), this investment will bring access to data for medical research into one location, meaning that researchers do not have to navigate different systems or make multiple applications for information for the same project. This in turn should reduce the time it takes to complete clinical trials. See more details on DHSC’s website.
2. New research on the UK clinical trials landscape
On the subject of clinical trials in the UK, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has published an analysis of clinical research in the UK. The MHRA says it will use the findings to guide future funding, policy and regulation. MHRA’s new clinical trials regulations are set to create a more efficient, streamlined and adaptable regulatory framework. A 12-month roll-out of the new regulations began this month for the biggest regulatory shake up of clinical trials in 20 years.
For more information on how the research will affect future clinical trials, see the news on MHRA’s website.
3. West Midlands Life Sciences Week 15-19 September 2025
There will be an inaugural Life Sciences Week from 15th to 19th September, and the event is underpinned by a West Midlands Life Sciences Week website.
WM Health Technologies Cluster is a partner organisation for Life Sciences Week.
It’s possible to register to attend, apply to host an event during Life Sciences Week and even to be a sponsor.
Check out the website.
WEST MIDLANDS REGION NEWS
1. Top tips for making your business more accessible
For top tips for making your business more accessible – and why it will boost your profits – have a read of this advice on Business Growth WM’s website.
The spending power of disabled households, known as the Purple Pound, is estimated to be worth £274 billion a year in the UK. Yet many businesses are unknowingly missing out on this market because their products, services, or physical spaces are not accessible to disabled people. In fact, businesses are losing around £2 billion a month by failing to meet the needs of disabled customers.
Take a look at the top tips and see how to make contact to get free further advice.
2. Spotlight on Advanced Manufacturing
The Department for Business and Trade (DBT) is currently running a Made in the UK Sold to the World Roadshow.
On 15th May 2025, the Roadshow comes to the ICC Birmingham, with a spotlight on Advanced Manufacturing.
One of six new roadshows that will be touring the UK this year, the programme is designed to facilitate world-class conversations and create quality connections. These Roadshows will help to build your business confidence and provide you with the information you need to fast-track your global growth.
The ICC Birmingham event on 15th May, with a special focus on Advanced Manufacturing, offers sessions that are accessible to everyone and will cover multiple overseas markets. So, whether you are an Advanced Manufacturing business or from another sector, don’t miss this chance to enhance your global reach.
See DBT’s website to find out more and to register your interest.
3. Innovation Awards: Nominations Now Open
The Innovation Awards recognise, celebrate and reward those companies, individuals and organisations dedicated to innovation. Now in their fifth year, these sell-out Awards raise the profile and confidence of winners with several going on to scoop the King’s Award for Innovation.
There are numerous categories including Life Sciences Innovator of the Year and Tech Innovator of the Year. Companies with innovations that have less than 12 months of traction are invited to apply for the New Innovation of the Year.
Nominations are open until 16th May. It takes about 3 minutes to nominate yourself or another. Nominations cost nothing but your time.
You can find out more about the awards and make your nominations here: https://innovation-awards.co.uk/
NATIONAL & INTERNATIONAL NEWS
1. Reactions to the announcement of NHS England’s abolition
The Prime Minister has announced that the Government will abolish NHS England, saying that the move will free up cash for frontline clinicians and services and cut down on bureaucracy.
Businesses’ responses to the news have been very mixed. Some applaud the determined effort to bear down on inefficiency and waste. Others are concerned about yet another NHS reorganisation and the impact on strategy and delivery during the next few years.
For a more detailed read of a whole range of views that have been expressed, see this article in Health Tech World.
2. £13.9 billion of R&D funding
The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) has set out this month how it will allocate £13.9 billion in funding for transformational research and development in the next year in areas like life sciences, green energy, engineering and beyond. UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) – the UK’s lead public research funder – will receive £8.8 billion over the next year.
Public investment in R&D helps grow the economy through new jobs and commercial opportunities. Each pound of public R&D investment is estimated to leverage double in private investment in the long run.
For the full details of the announcement, see DSIT’s website.
3. £1.5bn framework to upgrade NHS’s outdated IT systems
NHS Shared Business Services has launched a new framework agreement – Tech Devices – Link 4. The framework agreement streamlines procurement, enabling teams to buy the latest essential end-user hardware and devices from carefully vetted suppliers, quickly and compliantly.
The Tech Devices – Link 4 framework agreement comprises four Lots (categories) covering essential devices like desktops, laptops, tablets, and healthcare-specific equipment, such as medical workstations for efficient medication rounds, and clinical diagnostic monitors and displays. To support sustainability, the Refurbished and Remanufactured Devices Lot offers high-performance, cost-effective solutions that align with the NHS’s net-zero ambitions, supporting sustainability goals.
There are more details of the new framework agreement here.
Spotlight on…
Dr Pam Waddell OBE
After 15 years as Director of Innovation Alliance West Midlands (IAWM), Pam retired from her post. In her time in charge, Pam has ensured that IAWM has always been business-facing, promoting innovation to practical ends that support people, jobs and the local economy. Pam has powered IAWM forwards such that it has established networks of innovators, businesses, universities and other R&D assets second to none. Pam set up (a brilliant decision) the Virtual Innovation Team which has had two great advantages for our region. First, it has ensured that innovators and entrepreneurs will have access to accurate, relevant help and support for their ideas and their businesses. Secondly, the team of sector experts that has been established works cross-sector, thus avoiding silo thinking/working.
From all of us here at WMHTC we send you, Pam, our heartfelt thanks for all you have done for our region and we wish you a happy and healthy retirement.
This is a time of change for IAWM, as it moves away from being a public sector accountable body and starts the process of establishing a not-for-profit business in its place. The new Director is ex-Bruntwood Cliff Dennett, who will be known to many in our innovation ecosystem already. It falls to Cliff to carry through the changes at IAWM and we wish him every success in his mission. We can assure you, Cliff, of our help and support.
I hope you enjoy reading my e-bulletin. Feel free to contact me personally with your feedback and suggestions for future activities at david@wmhtc.co.uk
Regards,
Executive Chair.
