Funding success for innovation campus

Open innovation campus driving collaboration to improve healthcare has raised more than £200m.

The Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst (SBC), bringing together academia, industry, the NHS and others in the UK life sciences sector, is celebrating its fifth birthday. Founded by partners GlaxoSmithKline, Wellcome, the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, and Innovate UK in February 2012, SBC now has 49 tenants which have raised over £200m.

Martino Picardo, CEO of Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst, said, ‘SBC’s first five years have been a great success, and I would like to thank everyone, including our stakeholders, for their enthusiasm, support and hard work. Over the next five years we will continue to focus on working collaboratively to help grow the life sciences sector in the UK.’

SBC has created a vibrant campus community, with organisations of all sizes networking and collaborating.

High volume visitors increase the opportunities for fruitful interactions catalysing innovation. Other highlights include: development progress by some of SBC’s smallest corporate tenants, launch of an open innovation challenge in neurodegenerative diseases, and the establishment of translational laboratories by the University of Cambridge and UCL (University College London). MRC Technology’s Centre for Therapeutics Discovery and the Cell and Gene Therapy Catapult’s Large Scale Manufacturing Centre also relocated to the site.