Company Assessment Group Meetings

In the run up to our June Investment Forum we are holding a number of 'CAGs' to help the presenting companys hone down and refine their investment pitches. This is an invaluable opportunity for presenter's to get feedback, share good practice and eliminate glitches. Often it is not until entrepreneurs have made their pitch to investors and been turned down that they appreciate what they could improve on - and then it's just too little, too late. The CAGs are made up of the mentors that are assigned to each company that are drawn from our sponsors. The companies get high-quality feedback from people in the know. So when they present at the Forum, they have the best possible chance of winning over investors and raising the finance they need to make their dreams a reality. This mentoring and support is a key part of the Connect model.

Bioscience YorkshireEnterprise Fellows

Academic research targeted explicitly at producing commercialisable technology is the focus of what is said to be the largest cluster of its type in Europe. And its happening here in Yorkshire!
The Bioscience Yorkshire Enterprise Fellowship is designed for post-docs, researchers and PhD students who have the skills and the desire to create a business based on their research. The programme provides participants with the support and mentoring to commercialise their ideas and research findings. The goal of the scheme is to increase entrepreneurial activity in Yorkshire universities' bioscience departments and to accelerate and support the formation of solid and sustainable start-up bioscience businesses.

Attending presentations from the fellows, you could see how fired up about their research they were - but also how producing a commercial outcome was also explicitly part of their mindset - something that might have been alien to them had not this scheme focused their deliverables towards an addressable market! In the end this is what differentiates technology development from enterprise. Nearly half of the fellows are thinking about starting a business based on their ideas. Great stuff!