One of the leading life science organisations in the East Midlands held a Special Interest Group (SIG) meeting earlier this week, in partnership with the D2N2 Growth Hub.
Medilink East Midlands, based at Biocity Nottingham, on Pennyfoot Street in the City Centre, holds a number of Special Interest Groups throughout the year, with past events covering topics such as Supply Chains, 3D Printing and Additive Manufacturing. The SIG held last Wednesday (Feb 3), covered brain function, innovation and food supplements and featured talks from leading life science businesses Brunel Healthcare, DSM and Consult2Deliver.
The D2N2 Growth Hub – a support organisation serving the business community of the Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire area –works with a series of partners, including Medilink East Midlands to help ambitious businesses realise their aspirations for growth. Since its inception in December 2014, the D2N2 Growth Hub has helped over 1500 businesses access finance, support and advice in order to help them grow, as part of the wider D2N2 LEP – the Local Enterprise Partnership covering the same area – mission of creating 55,000 jobs in ten years (2013-2023).
As a part of its mission to boost and grow the Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire economy, D2N2 has identified 8 key sectors, which are industry areas where there is existing local business aptitude and the potential to support new businesses. One of these sectors is life sciences, and in October of 2014, D2N2 published a life sciences action plan, detailing how the sector could grow and what D2N2 would do to support it.
D2N2 further demonstrated its confidence in the life sciences sector by investing £487,500 in Chalice Medical, of Worksop, to enable it to move into new 25,000sq ft premises and a further £120,000 in the Ear Foundation. Based in Nottingham, the Ear Foundation – a charity which helps people with hearing difficulties – used the grant funding from D2N2 to help it move into its £700,000 Sherman Centre, fitted with the latest in hearing technologies and with the capacity to help over 3,000 people a year.
Since moving into the Sherman Centre, the Ear Foundation has gone on to win the ‘Outstanding Achievement’ award, at the annual Medilink East Midlands awards ceremony.
Both of the above grants were given as part of D2N2’s Unlocking Investment for Growth (UI4G) grant system. This was designed to help businesses bridge funding gaps on expansion projects which would help them grow and create jobs. Both of the above instances, as with all UI4G grant recipients, have helped to secure and create jobs through their expansion projects.
For more information about D2N2’s key sectors, click here.
For more information about Medilink East Midlands, click here
For more information about the D2N2 Growth Hub, and to enquire about its services, click here
