Better health outcomes are one of the fundamentals goals of all nations and the UK’s life science sector continues to produce innovations and scientific breakthroughs that save lives and reduce suffering here and around the world.
No one doubts the quality of the early-stage discovery research that happens on our shores, yet successive governments have become concerned at the spectre of great science being developed in the UK only to be commercialised elsewhere.
The Innovation Strategy published in July 2021 set out a long-term plan for delivering growth based around the knowledge economy.
It followed on from its predecessor, the 2017 Industrial Strategy, in prioritising the need to overcome the disconnect between what it called the “Invented in Britain/Made Elsewhere” syndrome.
The policy is driven by confidence in the economic benefits to the nation of the biotech sector realising its full potential.
These returns go straight to the heart of future-proofing UK Plc – creating a highly skilled workforce, that generates high value intellectual property.
Yet, if anything, the evidence over the last decade suggests that we have been losing ground in pharma, especially to the United States.
Yes
No
As part of a series of in-depth thought leadership exercises with industry leaders, Morgan Sindall Construction’s Northern Home Counties business and the Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst brought together key stakeholders to explore the UK’s challenge around improving the quality of our science infrastructure.
They considered the relationship between place, funding and skills and the question of Intelligent Solutions that will achieve a step change in building and operating life science estates with less carbon.
Stevenage was the ideal location for this debate.
Already renowned within biotech as the location of GSK’s global R&D centre, and one of the world’s most important clusters of expertise in cell and gene therapies, Stevenage is now the focus of a hugely ambitious real estate vision that will put the site at the forefront of UK growth in life science.
Around the table
Dr Sally Ann Forsyth OBE, Chief Executive, Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst
Will Rohleder, Director, Reef Group
Tom Pike, Deputy Chief Executive, Stevenage Borough Council
Adrian Hawkins OBE, Chair, Hertfordshire LEP Main Board + Chair, Stevenage Development Board
Edward Joslin, Development Director, Kadans
Dan Mason, Capital Portfolio Director, AstraZeneca
Annabel Lait, Director, Saunders Architecture and Urban Design
Tracy D'Souza, Regional Director, AECOM
Ian Grimes, Director of Estates, University of Hertfordshire
Emily Slupek, Partner, Bidwells
Brian Brookes, Head of Design, Morgan Sindall Construction, Northern Home Counties
Jamie Shearman, Area Director, Morgan Sindall Construction Cambridge
Matt Dunkley, Regional Design Lead, Morgan Sindall Construction Cambridge
David Rowsell, Morgan Sindall Construction, Northern Home Counties