After a test run last month, Newcastle Science City is challenging entrepreneurs and businesses in a slightly different way. Instead of waiting for the next big thing to come to its door, it is now sketching out problems that could do with a solution. John Hill talks to the organisation about its Business Opportunities programme.
A GOOD way to pitch an innovative product is to point out a problem, before presenting a simple, but effective solution. This isn’t what Newcastle Science City is doing here. They already have a problem. In fact, it’s rather a detailed problem, lovingly sketched out in a large chart.
What they’re looking for is someone that may be able to fill that gap, or maybe even someone that already has and forgot to let the rest of the world know.
“Rather than try to find solutions, we’ve gone problem-hunting”, says business mentor Matt Hindhaugh. “We’ve made the assumption that if we paint a scenario and give the creative people in the region a dirty piece of paper, they can come up with a solution.”
The thinking behind the Business Opportunities programme is a bit of a departure from previous Science City projects such as the Innovation Machine. That project – which was launched in 2009 – was designed to bring entrepreneurial talent to the region and allow them time and space to cook up ideas that dealt with an “unmet need”.
In the Innovation Machine, the “unmet need” was a crucial element of the ideas which would turn the ideas into high-growth businesses. However, in this case, Science City plans to take on the responsibility of identifying these problems. It aims to pinpoint concerns, challenges and gaps in the market by talking to universities, businesses and citizens, and then sketch them out in a detailed plan.
“The Innovation Machine project will come to an end next year, but there was a lot of talk about taking the learning out of what we’ve already done and looking at things we maybe didn’t do as well” says Hindhaugh.
“The business support function was largely based around waiting for people to bring an idea to us and ask if we could help. So we looked at how we could accelerate the amount of business creation and job growth by identifying the business opportunities that could be addressed by the region, without them necessarily having to find the problem first.
“It destroys the need to protect Intellectual Property, because there’s no IP in a problem. We’ve taken it out of the equation. We’ve turned it from technology looking for a market, to the other way around. We’re telling people about a problem, and allowing them to bring their own creativity.”
The challenge will address Science City’s key issues of ageing and health and sustainability, issues which have been at the core of much of its work for the last few years. Science City ran the concept by a couple of venture capital organisations before launching a low-key briefing session at the end of last month.
“We gave five days’ notice and publicised the event through our own network”, Hindhaugh says. “The event was oversubscribed.”
The first two “opportunities” were key questions for an ageing population. Firstly, how do we make organisations better prepared for the issues that arise in an ageing workforce? And secondly, how can we make life easier for people with limited dexterity to get in and out of buildings?
The questions were accompanied by a large chart, which sketched out issues such as the nature of the problem, indicated possible areas from which the solution may emerge, mapped out how Science City could provide support, and estimated the potential revenue. Which brings us to a telling anecdote about doors.
Hindhaugh says: “Of the people that came down, there were three organisations we could directly support in their own right, and one large one that was going to take a few years to develop. The others were capable of doing something revolutionary if they collaborated with each other.
“Of course, there was one chap whose uncle had designed a mechanism for opening Yale locks on wooden doors.
“His uncle’s mum had issues with her hands, and couldn’t physically get a key into a lock. Social Services were starting to think she was going to have to go into care.
“However, he developed an assistive technology which effectively guided the key into the lock and allowed her to open the door with her elbow. They patented the prototype and stuck it on her door, but never brought it to market. She got to stay in her house for another 10 years.
“This is a good example of a solution to a problem that’s already out there, but the person behind it may not have been pointed towards the opportunities.”
Hindhaugh is keen to point out that the Business Opportunities programme is not a competition, and that it can offer support to a wide range of businesses and individuals that have viable answers to its problems.
“The first time we did this, we said we wanted applications within two weeks”, he says. “The learning experience we got out of that was that we should have said we’d have the first round of support in two weeks’ time. So we’re leaving the opportunities up on the website, and they’re not going to expire until the issue ceases to be an issue.
“If it’s completely new and disruptive, then that’s great. But it’s also fine if it’s something that already exists and is just being re-applied. We’re trying to be incredibly inclusive. There are a huge amount of brilliant soloists out there, and we want to be the conductor that brings them together in harmony.”