Paula Rogers-Brown, Head of Communities & Ecosystem Engagement, Connect: Health Tech, shares her perspective on the challenges facing the UK health tech community and how with collaboration and a unified voice, we can overcome these to build the UK into a thriving health tech hub and life science superpower.

 

What are the major challenges facing health tech businesses in the UK?

 

The UK’s health tech ecosystem is rather fragmented, stemming from a positive trend for organic growth. As a consequence, this has fostered poor interconnectivity. It is well known that interdisciplinary collaboration is key for the success of most innovative industries, and this is just as true for health tech. To facilitate more collaboration, we need to overcome this fragmentation and build more connections. Locally, removing siloes will help complementary teams interact, but this should not be done at the expense of pan-regional collaboration as we need to harness the wealth of expertise available throughout the UK for long term growth.

At the interface of health, technology, engineering and AI, health tech faces its own language barriers: clinicians are unfamiliar with common tech terms and technology specialists are untrained in medical terminology. This challenge is not insurmountable, but it is easy to underestimate the time frames needed to overcome this and work well together on product development and commercialisation.

Another challenge is a lack of knowledge around entrepreneurship in the research community. There are incredible scientists and clinicians with potentially transformational ideas, but without a knowledge of routes to progress their innovation, and an understanding of aspects like IP, commercialisation, funding and regulation, their ideas may never reach the public. It is therefore vital that we share knowledge and resources about where these entrepreneurs can start, what do they need and where can they find more information?

To improve navigation across the ecosystem, Connect: Health Tech proactively aids these connections, collaborating with innovation hubs like Discovery Park, and forming a national network where ideas and information can be shared.

 

What do we need to do to support the UK health tech industry?

 

We need to build an industry with a porosity in knowledge exchange. Fellowships could be a good way to encourage this area – not just academic but industrial too – as they can be used to foster knowledge exchange between industries and different locations.

It’s also important that we invest in the infrastructure to develop both physical and digital communities that support these connections. Events and in-person connections form a cornerstone of all collaboration. Science parks like Discovery Park provide an ideal environment to bring together a diverse mix of stakeholders including academia, clinical innovators and industry for knowledge exchange and interdisciplinary innovation. We’ve also learned over the past few years that online communities can provide significant additional benefits, allowing these collaborations to continue between different locations in between these events, enabling existing ideas to develop and new opportunities to be identified.

I would also draw attention to the visibility of role models within the health tech community. We have an incredibly diverse population with different healthcare experiences and health technology has the potential to make real changes for everyone, but if the diversity of the population is not reflected in those developing innovative research and technologies, then solutions will have a limited market. To build this diversity into research and leadership teams, we need to highlight role models that are already there – after all, you can’t be what you can’t see.

 

Investment and development have often been targeted towards certain areas of the UK. Are there risks in focusing development within specific regions?

 

Co-location is a really powerful tool when it comes to sharing ideas and building a rich talent pool, but this shouldn’t be done at the expense of collaboration elsewhere. The UK punches above its weight scientifically. We are a relatively small country geographically and with the right networks, both regionally and nationally, we could strengthen our impact and attractiveness.

Another important consideration is ensuring research and innovation development is inclusive. Different regions within the UK have different demographics and we need to understand and incorporate that into our recruitment strategies. There is no one route for developing a new innovative med tech device, for example, and the health tech ecosystem needs to embrace employees from all backgrounds. That way we can be sure we are not missing opportunities to harness and develop talent on our doorstep which can lead to rich innovations we can all benefit from.

Science and research parks have a really important role in doing this as they are directly embedded in their local communities and can therefore work closely with schools, colleges and universities to promote STEM, the opportunities available, and develop their own talent pipeline.

As an example, Discovery Park provides a thriving community to build connections and exchange knowledge, including a Skills Hub that brings together the expertise of Kent Universities, colleges and industry to help businesses collaborate to overcome skills shortages. Adding in an online collaboration hub to these can extend those opportunities across the four nations – and internationally.

 

The NHS is a unique resource for the UK, what are the opportunities that this can bring?

 

At Connect: Health Tech, we support clinician-led innovation. The UK’s clinician base is a unique resource that has a truly in-depth understanding of the healthcare needs of our population. Through our community and digital platform, we are proactively working with clinicians to develop a suite of resources that supports their innovation journey. Supporting innovation from this community to ensure we are at the forefront of producing solutions that meet actual needs is really important to us at Connect: Health Tech.

Working with local NHS teams can be a huge asset to technology developers to ensure their technology is solving a genuine need. It can also result in superior product development by incorporating relevant data sets and ensuring optimisations are made with input from clinicians and patients alike. Research campuses like Discovery Park leverage relationships with their local NHS Trusts to facilitate collaborations with industry to drive purposeful innovation.

 

What other opportunities do you see for the UK health tech industry in the next five years and how can we help to deliver these?

 

Pan-regional collaboration is a fantastic opportunity that we are seeing a real shift towards, and we need to continue to develop this to see more of this kind of collaboration at scale. We’ve already seen the formation of a cross-regional innovation cluster between Cambridge and Manchester which will facilitate the sharing of expertise between these two knowledge-rich communities. Building relationships with other knowledge exchange hubs like Discovery Park allows further development of pan-regional collaboration to unlock even more opportunities for growth.

I was delighted that the government recently accepted all the recommendations from the independent review of university spin-out companies, including providing greater understanding of entrepreneurial skills in the academic setting. There is huge potential still to be realised from our wealth of successful academic institutions and we need to develop this potential by providing support, advice and training for founders wishing to commercialise their discoveries. Initiatives like the Eagle Lab at Discovery Park can provide fantastic support for fledgling businesses through programmes, mentorship and investor networking.

 

What do we need to do to ensure these opportunities aren’t missed?

 

We need to invest! The opportunities are clear, but they require investment, and these investments require some risk-taking on experimental technologies. We also need to invest in developing the right infrastructure, taking our communities with us through enablers like Connect: Health Tech, and building strong foundations for growth, as creating a solid health tech ecosystem reduces the risk of missed opportunities.

 

Paula Rogers-Brown

Head of Communities & Ecosystem Engagement, Connect: Health Tech

University of Cambridge

Paula leads on the strategic development and management of Connect: Health Tech, an interdisciplinary community of practice for health tech professionals bringing together a diverse range of stakeholders to build and integrate a thriving business and enterprise community.

• BugBiome raises £310k in pre-seed investment from Cambridge Angels and Discovery Park Ventures
• Investment enables a £330k Engineering Biology Grant from Innovate UK for cutting-edge agri-tech research leveraging the microbiome and engineering biology approaches.

Cambridge, UK, 12^th February 2024: BugBiome, a biotech harnessing nature’s microbial defences for pest protection to benefit human and planet health, has successfully closed a pre-seed funding round, securing £310k from Cambridge Angels and Discovery Park Ventures.

 

This investment will support BugBiome’s mission to address agricultural and human pest protection with naturally derived solutions harnessing the microbiome as a sustainable source of alternatives to synthetic and bio-accumulative chemicals. It also provides matched funding for a £330k Engineering Biology Grant from Innovate UK, to identify new methods to control aphids in crop protection. The 12-month project aligns with BugBiome’s focus for sustainable, insect control solutions that do not compromise biodiversity, including a pipeline of targets across human and agricultural pests.

Following the investment, Emma Palmer Foster of Discovery Park Ventures and James Thomas of Cambridge Angels join the Board as Investor Directors.

 

Dr Alicia Showering, co-founder and CEO of BugBiome, said: “We are delighted to announce a successful pre-seed funding round with the support of Cambridge Angels and Discovery Park Ventures. This investment enables our non-dilutive Innovate UK grant and will help us to advance our pipeline of innovative microbial solutions for pest protection, offering an effective alternative to chemicals. With this new funding, we are expanding our team, accelerating the development of our microbial products against pests.”

Dr Andy Richards, founder member of Cambridge Angels, added: “We have been impressed by the entrepreneurial acumen of the BugBiome team, who have achieved such a lot in a short time. The microbiome is increasingly being seen as a vitally important aspect of biological systems. The team at BugBiome have identified that the interaction between the microbiome on a surface, be that human skin or a plant surface, plays a vital role in the attraction of insects which can impact on human health and on the environment. We look forward to helping them on their journey to exploit these learnings.”

Emma Palmer Foster, Director, Discovery Park Ventures, said: “BugBiome’s ground-breaking research addresses a critical aspect of the global focus on feeding the population sustainably and enhancing crop protection. Our investment in BugBiome makes it our tenth portfolio company and underscores the company’s potential to make a significant and sustainable impact in the agricultural sector and human health.”

Women’s health has historically faced challenges and disparities, with issues often overlooked across all sectors. Not only with regards to conditions solely affecting women, but also understanding the different physiological responses that women have in areas such as cardiac disease and immune responses. It is also known that women use health technology differently to men, presenting clear opportunities to deliver measurable health benefits to over half of the population, as well as a huge market opportunity for businesses to target.

Femtech and women’s health innovation are increasingly growing areas, however there is a risk that the promise of these areas is not realised without recognising the challenges that remain. Dr MaryAnn Ferreux, Medical Director at Health Innovation Kent Surrey Sussex (HIKSS), and Melissa Ream, Specialist Commercial Advisor, HIKSS, share their perspectives on the potential opportunities in femtech and women’s health, and how we can work together to reap the benefits.

 

What are the major challenges facing women’s health in the UK?

MaryAnn Ferreux – The main challenges in women’s health stem from decades if not centuries of gender bias and discrimination. In the past, many women’s health complaints were attributed to being emotional or hysterical and these gender stereotypes often led to doctors mistreating women’s symptoms as a mental health condition, rather than a physical condition.

While that has changed, much of this inherent gender bias remains, with many clinical trials and research studies not assessing the impact on women.1 We have recognised that there is a gender-based data gap but now we need to overcome this. Data sets are very rarely analysed by gender, and yet it is almost universally recorded, so the disparities in how genders respond in different disease groups could and should be analysed routinely.

 

Melissa Ream – We often think about women’s health in terms of women’s conditions, be that menstrual health, maternity or menopause. But women’s health care is general health care too. The cardiac symptoms and risks for women are different to men, yet these are not widely known. And this comes down to under representation of women in data sets as well as unconscious bias in the wider world. If you search for images of people having a heart attack on Google, most of the images will be of men. Cardiovascular disease in women is a bigger killer than breast cancer2 and we need to start taking this more seriously, looking at how our clinical services are designed, delivered and promoted.

 

MaryAnn, you mentioned data sets. Do you think AI has the power to change this or do these concerns remain?

MaryAnn Ferreux – AI has a lot of potential to improve the health experiences of women, but there is a risk of building in more inequality if we do not address gender bias in data sets. More and more innovators are wanting to use AI in their technologies but some of them are not thinking about bias until it’s too late. A global analysis of AI systems found that 44% demonstrated a gender bias.3 We need to ensure that the data sets used are comprehensively analysed and shown to be relevant to the target population and this comes down to the decision makers asking the right questions, whether that’s innovators, regulators, funders or purchasers. I’m also concerned about a lack of leadership in AI regulation and who is at the decision-making table. Without diversity at that top level, it is unlikely that the right questions will be asked early enough – retrofitting later on just won’t work!

Learning from experience presents a huge opportunity, but one that we haven’t been previously good at. As an example, a lack of ethnicity data incorporated into skin algorithms resulted racial bias in pulse oximetry, ensuring that the device was not as effective for black and ethnic minority people.4 This disparity has been observed since the 90s5 and yet the device was still used during the Covid-19 pandemic, resulting in worse outcomes for black and ethnic minority people. We didn’t address the problem when we had the chance, and we need to ensure this doesn’t happen again.

 

So, what do we need to do to support equality in healthcare?

Melissa Ream – As MaryAnn says, having people at the decision-making table is vital to ensure that equality is incorporated into our systems. There is still a shortage of women in leadership roles even in the femtech industry and this needs to change, from more women at C-level, to more women investors. With women making up just 22%3 of AI workers, we need active engagement from all sides to help make this change. Role models are a powerful tool; if you can’t look above for inspiration then you’re unlikely to move in that direction. It’s therefore so important that we build networks to support this. Innovation hubs like Discovery Park play a powerful role in this, providing a network to support women in leadership positions and a platform that draws attention to the issues and also to those overcoming them. When we see good practice, let’s talk about it!

 

MaryAnn Ferreux – To make change happen, we need to use both a stick and a carrot. There must be something built into our structures and processes that sets out expectations and ensures compliance with health equity. But we also need to use financial levers as a carrot, with investors and purchasers demonstrating an interest in this area and making decisions that reflect a commitment to reducing health inequalities.

 

What would be on your women’s health manifesto to help guide this change?

MaryAnn Ferreux and Melissa Ream – There are three areas to focus on that we believe will see real results:

 

• Leadership – Women currently make up just 20-25% of leadership in digital, tech and AI.6 This needs to change to reflect the wider population and their health care needs. We also need to promote and support women innovators to enter Femtech and maximise commercial opportunities that improve women’s health.
• Policy and Commissioning – Those determining the focus of our health and care policies need to be inclusive and incorporate diversity requirements, ensure that a wide range of women’s voices are heard, and that commissioning reduces gender health gaps.
• Data sets – Data sets need to reflect their target audience and not exclude minority groups. Existing data sets may not be inclusive, so trials and data sets need to be designed and analysed with this in mind. This also presents an opportunity where having a comprehensive understanding of the data can result in the development of more tailored care including personalised interventions with the potential to reduce health inequalities.

 

You’re both based in Kent. How important do you think local networks are to support these changes?

Melissa Ream – Change doesn’t exist in a vacuum, it takes work across the entire system, and local hubs are an excellent starting point. By working together locally to understand the problems and bringing together groups to address these problems, we can see real impact. There are important roles for everyone within the industry, from the NHS to individual companies, hubs like Discovery Park and national networks like Barclays Eagle Labs and Health Innovation Networks. If we collaborate, we can make health care more equitable, close the gap and reduce inequalities.

 

MaryAnn Ferreux – Discovery Park is in an exciting position, embedded in the start-up community but with close links to the NHS and academia, there is opportunity to set a standard and drive this campaign forward. Discovery Park Ventures is already investing in women led femtech companies, and I enjoyed joining the team at Giant Health to discuss the challenges and opportunities in this space.

 

Discovery Park recently hosted a panel at Giant Health on ‘Unlocking Opportunities in Women’s Healthcare’. The panel was moderated by Sylvia Stevenson, Founder, Absolute Diversity, and featured Dr MaryAnn Ferreux, Medical Director, Health Innovation Kent Surrey Sussex, Lina Chan, Holland & Barrett General Manager Wellness Ventures and CEO, Founder at Parla, Melisa Guven, Associate, Monograph Capital and Karina Vazirova, Co-Founder & CEO, Femtech Lab.

 

 

Image (L-R): The Discovery Park panel at Giant Health on ‘Unlocking Opportunities in Women’s Healthcare’ with Lina Chan, Dr MaryAnn Ferreux, Melisa Guven, Karina Vazirova and Sylvia Stevenson.

Mayer Schreiber, CEO of Discovery Park, and Chris Broom, Head of Business Development at Discovery Park, recently attended the JP Morgan Healthcare Conference in San Francisco to build global connections and raise awareness of the opportunities in the UK for the biotech industry, as well as exploring opportunities for Discovery Park Ventures and its portfolio companies. The conference brought together thousands of industry experts from across the globe to discuss the biggest challenges and opportunities for 2024 and beyond.

The outlook from the conference for 2024 was cautious optimism, though overall, very positive. Several large deals were announced at the end of 2023, showing positive signs for the biotech industry. While the market is still in a downturn, brilliant science and innovation will still attract funding to create opportunities for the industry.

There were interesting discussions about what the innovation landscape will be like this year, including the short-term GLP-1 agonist success, and what new innovative drugs we can look forward to in the next decade. Also discussed at the conference was innovation around RNA technologies and the delivery of those — an area Discovery Park tenant and investee company, Vitarka Therapeutics, is active in.

The prominence and opportunity around AI for healthcare was a big topic at the conference, including how AI will help identify targets with specificity using genetic data. Big Tech is pushing more into generative AI for drug discovery to increase efficiency of clinical trials and regulatory approvals. Another common theme among panel discussions was cell and gene therapies. This was no surprise, with the conference coming just a month after the FDA’s approval of two gene therapies for sickle cell disease.

Also discussed were neuroscience, antibody drug conjugates and the importance of women’s health. Supporting the inclusion and empowerment of women is a priority for Discovery Park. Many of Discovery Park Ventures’ investments have gone to female-led businesses. For example, Discovery Park investee BoobyBiome, a UK biotech start-up developing products that deliver vital microbes to support infant gut flora and boost early immune system development, was founded by an all-female team of scientists.

There was a strong presence of UK companies at the conference, representing the UK’s expert capabilities both in academia and in translation. The Department for Business and Trade also attended the conference to promote inward investment opportunities, build confidence in UK life sciences, and connect companies with global investors and partners. Being part of the vibrant atmosphere at JP Morgan demonstrated the potential opportunities that can be gained by enhancing global networks in order to grow the sector.

There is a growing trend for biotech companies to outsource the development and manufacture of drugs in order to benefit from specialist knowledge and lower costs. This paired with increased demand for small molecule drugs presents a significant growth opportunity for CDMOs, evidenced by strong interest from the global CDMO industry in Discovery Park’s Active Pharmaceutical Ingredient (API) and drug product manufacturing facilities. CDMOs require advanced facilities integrating the latest technologies to take advantage of this growing demand and Discovery Park presents a promising option for those companies looking to expand their capacity and remain competitive.

Despite the challenging wider economic landscape for the biotech industry, there was a great sense of optimism at the JP Morgan Healthcare Conference. Finance will still be a challenge for the industry, but biotech innovation will always be important due to its impact on people’s lives. Collaboration and forging closer relationships both nationally and internationally will support the UK’s strength in this space.

Photo: Chris Broom and Naz Bashir. With thanks to Michaela Joy Photography and Perkins Coie.

Discovery Park Ventures (DPV) announces an investment of £100K into Vox Imaging Technology Ltd. (VIT), an ambitious ophthalmic technology company looking to transform eye imaging in preclinical research and improve drug discovery and development. Its compact and customisable instrument is believed to be the first scanning laser ophthalmoscope especially designed for laboratory use, able to produce high-quality data rapidly. Vox Imaging is the eighth investment from DPV’s first fund.

Prevalence of diseases of the eye (such as age-related macular degeneration) and conditions in which the eye may be affected (such as diabetes) is increasing as the population ages. The resultant demand for new and better medicines for these conditions is helping to drive the global drug discovery market, expected to be worth over US $120 billion by 20301, and the need for new research instruments such as the VoxOne scanning laser ophthalmoscope.

Vox Imaging Technology was founded in 2021 by Peter West and Alan Robinson, who have extensive experience in developing innovative ophthalmic imaging systems from roles in industry and academia.

Discovery Park Ventures (DPV) recognised the VIT team’s expertise in this high potential market and the advantages its technology offers over existing products.

The investment will enable the company to move into new premises at Discovery Park and will facilitate the completion of a working prototype and proof of concept testing prior to launch in 2025. The majority of customers are expected to be pharmaceutical and biotech companies or contract research organisations. Following the investment, DPV Director Dr Martino Picardo joins the company as Interim Chairman while fellow DPV Director Emma Palmer Foster joins Vox Imaging as Investor Director.

Peter West, Chief Technology Officer and Founder, Vox Imaging Technology, said: “We’re gratified that Discovery Park Ventures recognised the potential impact of accurate ophthalmic imaging in early-stage research. Not only will their investment help to drive the development of our technology, but Discovery Park also offers the ideal location for us to grow the business with high-specification facilities, access to a wide network of potential partners and advisors, and a strong academic research community on our doorstep.”

Mayer Schreiber, Chairman of Discovery Park Ventures, commented: “High resolution, easy to use preclinical ophthalmic imaging will facilitate progress towards new treatments for eye-related diseases. We’re excited to invest in such a promising business that already calls Kent home and are pleased to welcome the team to Discovery Park.”

DPV was set up by Discovery Park in 2022 to invest in promising, fast-growing life-science companies. The fund recently expanded to £3m and has plans to expand up to £25m in the next three years. DPV invests in novel and disruptive technologies related to Discovery Park’s areas of focus and investee companies have strong collaborative relationships with Discovery Park.

• BugBiome wins a business support package worth over £100,000, including one year of free lab space at Discovery Park and £50,000 investment from Discovery Park Ventures
• BioMavericks was awarded the wildcard prize as voted for by the audience at the GIANT Health Healthcare Investment Show on 5^th December

BugBiome was announced as the winner of the Discovery Spark life science business support programme at the GIANT Health Healthcare Investment Show on 5^th December. BugBiome will be awarded a business support package worth over £100,000, including one year of free lab space at Discovery Park and £50,000 investment from Discovery Park Ventures.

Eleven start-ups took part in the programme, including 3D Synthesis, Awen, Bing Bong Bio, BioMavericks, BugBiome, CardioCrown, DLOC Biosystems, Dravya Discovery, KASNMR, Rapidx Bio, and The Future Care. They participated in in-person training sessions, covering topics such as building an excellent team, understanding and conveying business metrics, and building a strong brand, as well as extensive networking and mentoring opportunities. Having refined their pitches throughout the programme, six finalists pitched to investors and other audience members as part of the GIANT Health conference.

BugBiome was chosen as the overall winner based on its promising business offering and extensive progress throughout the programme. The company is harnessing the power of the skin microbiome to repel pests, utilising natural bacteria to create effective, long-lasting repellents.

Alicia Showering, Founder and CEO at BugBiome, said: “We’re so excited to win the Discovery Spark programme following a fantastic eight weeks learning from industry leaders and our fellow start-ups. We’re passionate about stopping the spread of deadly vector-borne diseases like malaria and dengue and Discovery Spark has given us some excellent tools and connections to further progress our business and make this a reality.”

Based on the strength of the participating companies, Discovery Park decided to offer a wildcard prize in addition to the overall winner. BioMavericks was selected as the wildcard winner, following the audience vote at the GIANT Health Healthcare Investment Show. The company will be awarded six months free lab space at Discovery Park as well as business support from Barclays Eagle Labs and the programme’s partners. BioMavericks is an early-stage biotech start-up, focused on developing an in vitro diagnostic blood test for pancreatic cancer to revolutionise cancer diagnostics using AI-driven biotechnology.

Discovery Park’s Head of Innovation, Renos Savva, who led the programme, said: “We were thrilled to welcome such a promising group of start-ups to Discovery Park to share experience and ideas from specialists within the industry. We saw all of the participants develop their businesses over the course of the programme and I am excited to witness their further growth in the coming months and years. Choosing the winner was a very tough task and I would like to congratulate all the companies involved. Particular congratulations go to BugBiome and BioMavericks on their wins, and I look forward to welcoming them to Discovery Park and continuing to work with them. Many thanks to all our supporting companies, facilitators and advisors for making the programme such a success.”

Mayer Schreiber, CEO at Discovery Park, added: “The Discovery Park team prides itself on supporting the next generation of life science leaders, and our Discovery Spark programme is the embodiment of that. Working with these companies has demonstrated the wealth of innovation we have in the UK and it excites me to see how they will progress in the future. Congratulations to the winners, we look forward to welcoming you to Discovery Park soon.”

Thank you to our prize partners and facilitators including Kreston Reeves, SRG, Prismea Limited, Sciad Communications, Abel + Imray, Barclays Eagle Labs, Researcher, Janne Bate, Phillipa Clark, Michal Barski, Michael O’Neill, Michelle Yeoman ACC, David Savva, Mark Preston, Cameron Watson, Helen Banyard, James Easley.

Discovery Park Ventures (DPV) announces the expansion of its early-stage life science fund from £1m to £3m, in order to capitalise on exciting investment opportunities and support its existing portfolio. The fund’s investors have committed an additional £2m, which will also enable the fund to take larger stakes in companies that strongly align with its strategic objectives.

DPV was formed in 2022 by Discovery Park to invest in promising, fast-growing life-science companies with close links to the innovation ecosystem at Discovery Park. The first £1m tranche of DPV is now fully invested. Recent investments include Optceutics Ltd, an ophthalmology drug development company that uses its pharmacokinetic model, PK-Eye™, to accelerate the development of ocular formulations. Two others will be announced shortly. DPV is also invested in Vitarka Therapeutics, VisusNano, Booby Biome, Neobe Therapeutics, Ignota Labs and Oxford Medical Products.

The first transactions from the second tranche of the fund have been follow-on funding rounds into two existing portfolio companies, one of which is Ignota Labs (focused on preventing safety failures in drug discovery with Explainable AI). New investments are also being reviewed. Discovery Park Ventures will be presenting some of its portfolio at Giant Health’s ‘Healthcare Investment Show’ in partnership with Discovery Park in London tomorrow (December 5^th 2023).

Mayer Schreiber, Chair of Discovery Park Ventures and CEO of Discovery Park, commented: “Our portfolio of investments is making strong progress, and we are delighted by the support our investors have shown us with this second tranche of funding. It is the first step in Discovery Park Ventures’ planned expansion, and we look forward to working with regional investment groups and other funds as we grow.”

DPV has plans to further expand the fund up to £25m in the next three years with a focus on companies developing novel and disruptive technologies that have strong collaborative relationships with Discovery Park.

An interview with Dr Mayur Vibhuti, Chief Clinical Information Officer NHS Kent & Medway Integrated Care Board (ICB), NHS England Clinical Entrepreneur Fellow, and Martin Carpenter, Chief Digital Transformation Officer NHS Kent & Medway ICB.

 

The NHS is considered by many to be one of the UK’s proudest achievements, but it is also under undeniable strain, with the current situation unsustainable for clinicians and patients alike. Opportunities lie in the integration of innovative solutions, both operational and clinical technologies, but this is often easier said than done.

At NHS Kent & Medway, Dr Mayur Vibhuti, Chief Clinical Information Officer, and Martin Carpenter, Chief Digital Transformation Officer, are working to find ways to integrate new technologies in a way that will transform the NHS to deliver for our current and future society. They recently hosted a reverse pitching event at Discovery Park to bring together key stakeholders and encourage cross-collaboration to generate meaningful solutions for real problems.

 

What was the idea behind the reverse pitching event and what were you aiming to achieve?

Mayur: Having been involved in setting up a primary care innovation hub in Medway before the Covid pandemic, we wanted to recreate something similar. Often solutions that are being developed by industry don’t match the immediate need. We want to bring together industry and academic partners with clinicians to develop solutions for current systemic problems that no one organisation could solve.

Martin: I’m pretty new to the NHS. I joined at the start of this year having worked in the private sector for most of my career. When I was on the panel at the Innovation Summit at Discovery Park, there was a question from the audience: ‘how does the NHS encourage innovation?’. In my experience, the answer is not very well! The NHS is not set up in a way that supports innovation as there are so many different organisations across the system. Start-ups don’t have the time or money to talk to multiple people within the system in order to find the right fit. The NHS therefore has to think differently around innovation.

The foundation of a good start-up is a good product market fit; if you don’t get that right you’ll fail at some point on your journey. The reverse pitch is designed to make sure the product market fit is right using real world NHS problems that need fixing, not just an academic exercise.

Mayur: The reverse pitching event stemmed from a desire to bring all the relevant people together around one subject matter using a problem-based methodology. When Martin met Jane Kennedy, Chief Business Officer at Discovery Park, at their Innovation Summit earlier this year, it was clear that our ambitions aligned with those of the team and companies at Discovery Park and it all came together.

We took three wicked problems – how to diagnose cancer faster using existing systems; how to improve the logistics around long term care management; and how to improve preventative care – and put them in front of an audience of academia and industry. These may not seem like super complicated problems outside of the NHS, but within the organisation there isn’t the relevant expertise or the money to solve them. We knew we wouldn’t get solutions on the day, but we wanted to make connections and focus minds on the pressing issues for the NHS and how their solutions might align.

 

How was the event? What key themes emerged from the day?

Martin: As the first event we’ve organised for this purpose, we’re really pleased with the result. It was great to see over 50 people from a vast array of backgrounds including primary care, academia, industry and VCs all in the same room and create a buzz around the aims of our network.

One key theme that emerged was around workflow and making it easier for people in the NHS to do their jobs. Current systems require high levels of training to make sure jobs can be done rather than using technology to drive process adherence and standardisation. There is a clear opportunity here that is still to be realised.

Mayur: This was a bit of a soft launch to see what would happen, but we’re really pleased with how it turned out. We saw lots of networking which is a key goal for us – bringing together people with aligned purposes who should have met but hadn’t yet. Health care is complex and we’re unlikely to get linear solutions but by making the introductions and seeing opportunities to facilitate collaboration we’re aiming to demystify both sides.

 

What are your plans for future events?

Mayur: We’re not planning to have a strict rule as to what the innovation hub is, we want to be agile and go where the energy is. We’re aiming to provide a forum for people with a shared purpose but going about it in different ways. This will be the golden thread connecting all our activities coming up.

Martin: More of the same really! We want to get more people involved who are at the right stage for the NHS, with sufficient product development to have a viable solution, but not so far developed that it’s too late to tailor their offering to ensure that alignment.

 

What are the current hold ups for industry/NHS collaboration?

Martin: The NHS has a way of working which isn’t suitable to encourage a start-up ecosystem – and the challenge is for the NHS to adapt not the other way round. We need to change the way of working and thinking to encourage risk taking and agile thinking. This will need to create slick internal processes that allow quick decision making as without that start-ups will fail.

Mayur: The best analogy I’ve heard recently is that people think the NHS is a whale but it’s actually a shoal of fish – all moving in the same direction but thousands of different organisations with their own goals and processes. This doesn’t make it easy for start-ups to interact with. And change isn’t easy as people within the NHS are too busy delivering their own goals to take a broader overview of the situation. There are a cohort of people who want to make change, but it is too difficult and they are too time poor to do so. We need to introduce a space to make the process easier.

 

What are the benefits of regional networks to drive this collaboration?

Mayur: Regional networks will be key to aligning purpose and delivering a real impact. We need to build an innovation pathway that enables ideas or products to be tested at a local level to measure impact, then expanded more widely across the county, and the country once we’ve shown they work. We don’t have a postcode to national pathway, but if we got the postcode to county pathway right, we could then recreate this elsewhere.

Martin: These regional centres are important for a number of reasons. The primary goal of the Integrated Care Boards is to reduce healthcare inequalities, which are a major concern. For example, there is a difference in life expectancy for men of over four years between Thanet and Maidstone. It is well known that economic prosperity correlates with health outcomes, so if we can stimulate an innovation ecosystem in Kent & Medway, we will not only find solutions for major healthcare challenges but also build a more prosperous, skilled workforce, and generate healthier outcomes. Bringing innovation into the mainstream is therefore vital to reduce these inequalities and improve outcomes.

Discovery Park is an amazing resource within Kent & Medway with innovative companies and high-tech lab space on our doorstep, alongside several leading universities. We have a fantastic opportunity to create a centre of excellence in life science and economic prosperity here by working together.

 

What more can we do to build on this?

Mayur: As a community we need to make a concerted effort to step outside of our organisational position on certain things to enable innovation. We need to come together, try different things and support people with the time they need to think differently. Risk and governance can kill innovation in public services, but with more collaboration this doesn’t have to be the case.

Martin: We really welcome feedback on how to improve our approach so please get in contact if you have any ideas that could help to deliver better outcomes for patients and create economic vibrancy in Kent.

 

To get involved or learn more contact info@discovery-park.co.uk.

 

Martin Carpenter

Martin is Chief Digital Transformation Officer for NHS Kent & Medway ICB, joining the NHS in January 2023. Martin’s experience covers Pharma, a Genomics startup, UK Chief Information Officer (CIO) for Optum, tele-radiology, Social Housing and outsourcing. He is a Certified Healthcare CIO, Fellow of the Institute of Directors and has specific expertise in organisational transformation and Cyber.

Dr Mayur Vibhuti

Dr Mayur Vibhuti is a Fellow of the Royal College of General Practitioners with a varied experience of medical education, innovation, and transformation roles in primary care. He is currently Chief Clinical Information Officer for NHS Kent & Medway ICB and NHS England Workforce Training & Education directorate GP Associate Dean clinical lead for NHS Kent & Medway Training Hubs. He is also an NHS England Clinical Entrepreneur Fellow & a Visiting Reader in Medical Leadership at Canterbury Christ Church University, Kent.

He has run innovative training programmes for GPs & Multi-professionals working in primary care and set up a pan system innovation hub to accelerate adoption of new technologies.

Following today’s autumn statement, there are promising signs of support for the UK’s vital industries, including £4.5 billion of funding for British manufacturers. Discovery Park’s designation as a Life Science Opportunity Zone recognised the park’s growth potential, highlighting the science park’s fantastic infrastructure and ability to support advanced manufacturing. We prioritise the development of sustainable solutions and are pleased to see the commitment to support clean energy included as part of this plan.

With many high-growth businesses based on site, the announced pension reforms and new Growth Fund within the British Business Bank are a welcome inclusion. We look forward to witnessing the impact of this £75 billion of financing for these high-growth companies. This, combined with the announced expense tax cuts, will allow these companies to invest in important equipment to cement their growth.

AI is already playing a significant role in the development of new medicines and technologies, so the £500 million to support Compute innovation centres will be vital to build the UK’s reputation in this growing area and we anticipate the benefits of this growth being felt across industries. We can already see the benefits that convergence is bringing to the life sciences sector and the growing emergence of ‘techbio’ in accelerating the pace of drug development.

The announcement of £20 million in funding for new dementia treatments will be key to developing novel therapies and likely benefit thousands of people, however, the lack of a comprehensive plan to build the life sciences industry is disappointing. The sector is still booming, and we’ve seen an uplift in demand for lab space from new and growing businesses at Discovery Park.

In order to realise the UK’s potential as a science superpower, a focused strategy will be needed alongside an ability to think ‘outside the triangle’. We hope to see the government share more around this in the coming days.

The performance of the county’s property industry reflects the recent changes to how the public lives, works and plays, according to this year’s Kent Property Market Report.

Recognising that the country has experienced the economic shocks of the emergence from Covid; the war in Ukraine, and rises in inflation and interest rates, the report highlights that Kent’s property sector is showing early signs of recovery with investment coming forward, especially in the logistics and distribution, science park sectors, and the tourism and leisure industry.

Now in its 32nd edition, the annual Kent Property Market Report is produced by Caxtons Property Consultants, Kent County Council and Locate in Kent.

 

Cllr Roger Gough, Leader of Kent County Council, said: “It’s clear from the report that it continues to be a challenging environment for the industry, with the winners and losers closely linked to changes in how we all live and work.

“What remains unchanged is Kent’s competitive advantage from its proximity to London thanks to its motorway and rail connections, and links to Europe via the cross-Channel ports. Investing in infrastructure is crucial and we recently celebrated the opening of Thanet Parkway railway station. We continue to push the Government for greater investment in the county’s road network, including a start date for the Lower Thames Crossing and widening of the A2, as well as lobbying Eurostar for the return of services via Kent on HS1.

“With online sales up 45% since the start of the pandemic, trading conditions continue to be tough for many high street retailers with the major beneficiary being the logistics and distribution sector which continues to invest across the county. It is good to see is our town centres being recognised as a government priority, with funding support for a number of them, which will persuade more new stores to open in some of them.”

 

Once again Kent’s location, close to London, means it has outperformed certain sectors in the South East. Demand for commercial space, especially in the logistics and distribution sector, continues to drive rental growth, which is helping to persuade market leading developers to invest.

The county’s science and innovation sectors, both vital to the economic wellbeing of the country’s economy, have also seen investment and take-up of space. The increased global investment in R&D spending in the life science sector post-pandemic is supporting growth at Discovery Park and Kent Science Park, with both bringing new laboratory space onstream.

 

Mark Coxon, Head of Commercial Agency at Caxtons, added: “Kent’s industrial property sector continues to blaze a trail for growth, with developers benefitting from rental growth that’s beyond the South East average. While land values may have fallen from their peak, investment continues notably in Dartford, Medway, Sittingbourne, and Tonbridge and Malling.

“The impact of how many of us have changed the way we work, especially those who are office-based, is now playing out with businesses and the public sector reviewing their property requirements. With hybrid working looking like it is here to stay, the biggest winners are the co-working space providers, with Kent increasingly well served at the moment.”

 

Kent’s leisure and tourism sector has bounced back with domestic overnight spend worth £477m in 2021, up 97% on the previous year, stimulating major investments. The result has been an economic tonic for coastal communities, such as Folkestone and Margate, but also Kent’s market towns and villages.

Simon Ryan, Investment Director, Locate in Kent, said: “Again, the Kent Property Market Report shows the region’s real estate resilience despite the challenges of recent years. Investment here brings prosperity for the whole country. Our own research suggests £23 billion in Gross Value Added (GVA) could be added by the region to the UK economy by 2050 as investment is made – from delivering faster, more sustainable distribution of goods through the Channel Ports and science park expansion to the green jobs that will supercharge manufacturing, logistics, construction and food production in the region and beyond.

“Our local challenge is to be more agile in responding to market needs through local planning authorities collaborating across boundaries. The planning system needs to analyse economic needs regionally to bring forward more employment sites and infrastructure and not according to arbitrary administrative boundaries. We need to act ‘larger than local.”

 

The residential property market has been cooled by interest rate rises and the cost-of-living crisis, but according to the Q2 2023 figures from the Land Registry, Kent house prices are still 2% up on the Q2 2022, with Tunbridge Wells the top performer at 10.1% up during the period. Some housebuilders have paused their land buying activities, despite prices having fallen by 10-11% from their peak. The situation is made more challenging for housebuilders due to the ongoing absence of a clear solution to the nutrient neutrality issue, and uncertainty over the Government’s renewable energy and biodiversity agenda. However, major schemes, such as Ebbsfleet Garden City, Otterpool, and Mountfield Park, near Canterbury, continue to progress.

Keynote speakers at the report’s launch included Jane Kennedy, Chief Business Officer at Discovery Park, who highlighted how its community of science and businesses on the site at Sandwich has grown and is now worth more than £324m a year to the UK economy. She was joined on stage by Liz Hamson, editor in chief of BE News, the online industry property news service, who gave her personal take on the performance of the sector and outlook for Kent.

 

 

Jane Kennedy commented, “The new Kent Property Market Report reflects ongoing changes in our economy, including the growing importance of R&D and the life sciences. With R&D spending set to rise to 2.4% of GDP by 2027, we’re seeing an increase in demand for laboratory space at Discovery Park, and we’ve welcomed a number of exciting science-based businesses to site.

“Within easy reach of London and the Golden Triangle, Discovery Park provides lab space and headspace located in beautiful Kent countryside with affordable living costs. We look forward to welcoming more businesses to the area and continuing to develop this thriving hub of opportunity, both for the science community and the wider Kent economy.”

 

The launch of the 2023 Kent Property Market Report was supported by Clear MPW, DHA, Hollaway Studio, MHA, Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) and Thomson Snell & Passmore. It was unveiled on 7 November to an audience of 260 industry guests at the Ashford International Hotel.

For further information on the latest performance of the county’s property industry, visit www.kentpropertymarket.com.