Business for Life in North-East England

Mar 13 2007 By The Journal

Cels, the Centre of Excellence for Life Sciences, is the organisation funded by regional development agency One NorthEast to support and develop the healthcare and life sciences industry in the region.

Its aim is to drive sustainable business growth to enable North-East England to compete on the global life sciences stage.

Healthcare already represents a large slice of the region's economy with a turnover of £4bn from more than 5,000 organisations employing 140,000 workers. CELS's target is to grow this sector by more than £1bn per year by 2015. To achieve this CELS is playing a pivotal role in bringing together academia, scientific research, the public sector and industry.

Its success depends on a world-class and financially robust research base with growth in both public and private sector investment. In essence, the healthcare sector in North-East England is made up of three main parts:

* Research expertise in the five regional universities.

* Clinical excellence in hospitals.

* A rapidly expanding industrial base.

Healthcare enjoys a prominent position in the region's strategic growth plans and its Regional Economic Strategy. Vital for the future prosperity of the region, CELS is helping to achieve this aim by:

1 Creating physical environments for early-stage life science businesses

CELS recently opened high-specification incubator facility, CELS at Newcastle, at Newcastle University's medical faculty, designed to help fast track scientific ideas from North-East England's top universities into commercial concerns. CELS is also developing additional space at the International Centre for Life in Newcastle and there are plans for healthcare business park developments in other parts of the region - from Northumberland in the north, to County Durham in the south.

2 Facilitating networks that enable regional businesses and the scientific community to interact and share best practice

For example, the CELS-operated Healthcare Network is a membership organisation open to all healthcare companies in North-East England. It was created to support, strengthen and grow the region's healthcare sector and is proving popular with business leaders and scientist alike.

It is backed by funding from the regional development agency One NorthEast (ONE) and the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), which helps it to run a full programme of activities, events and international trade missions for members.

Having already attracted more than 100 members, Healthcare Network now includes the full spectrum of regional healthcare companies, with members active in assistive technology, biologics, health informatics and medical devices.

3 Nurturing technological ideas into commercially-viable products or services

CELS' expertise in technology management consultancy ranges from acting as the commercial agent for the North-East Stem Cell Institute, to assisting individual companies with commercialisation and business plans.

An example of this work is InSTeP, a regional design initiative for the development of innovative healthcare technology.

A unique collaboration with Northumbria University, the InSTeP programme offers an integrated design service to small to medium-sized businesses developing products and services for the healthcare sector.

* For more information on healthcare and life science activities in North-East England please call (0191) 211-2626 or visit www.celsatlife.com