She's the chief executive of Anglia Innovation Partnership LLP - the organisation that manages Norwich Research Park. Two years into the post, Roz Bird reflects on the research cluster's rapid expansion and what the future holds.
What is Norwich Research Park?
Norwich Research Park is a research and innovation campus. There are over 150 science parks in the UK, but only five are BBSRC [Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council] funded research and innovation campuses - and we’re one of them, meaning we receive government funding for strategic research programmes.
We’re unique among that five because we have three of BBSRC’s research institutes here on the Norwich Research Park campus: the Quadram Institute, the John Innes Centre and the Earlham Institute.
It means we get 40pc of BBSRC’s strategic funding for research institutes every year.
Why is this so important for Norwich Research Park?
It means we’re a national asset. We attract scientists from all around the world and we have over 80 different nationalities represented here.
The reason the government funds our research is not only to find answers to unique problems, but also to have a positive impact on the economy – creating jobs, spinout companies and new start-ups.
READ MORE: Norwich Research Park shortlisted for industry award
We serve four global markets: agri-biotech, food-biotech, industrial-biotech and med-tech.
We’ve got around 40 companies including paying tenants and a growing list of virtual tenants, who are companies that benefit from using our address and being members of the community but don’t have a rented space on site.
We have over 3,000 researchers here, including those that have got their PhDs and come here to work in groups with a lead scientist.
What does the future hold?
I advised the board that we needed to be investment-ready in order to access the circa £200m plus that we would need to start building out the million square foot of planning consent.
We really need the new buildings because we’ve got growing companies here. We’ve been in negotiation with a new investor and we’re so close to being able to finalise that.
When that happens it will be a gamechanger for us. We need to secure investment, which is likely to be before the end of the year.
We’re currently in a conference and exhibition period where we’re going out to events to present Norwich Research Park on global platforms.
We use them as a showcase to explain what’s going on here and anyone can attend.
We’ve appointed Sam Graham as our new enterprise network manager. Her role is the final piece of the jigsaw to pilot how we accelerate the companies here spinning in and out.
We now want to hear from people who are used to working with entrepreneurs who want to volunteer their time to help accelerate businesses at the campus.
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