Advocacy
The world according to
UKSPA and its Members
UKSPA Sci-Tech
Daresbury Conference
A summary of events
from the latest
UKSPA Member
meeting
O
n 5-6 October, in a packed-
out Merrison Lecture Theatre
at Sci-Tech Daresbury, the latest
UKSPA Member meeting kicked
off with the Association’s AGM.
Chairman David Hardman announced
that Patrick Bonnett, National Innovation
Centre for Ageing, Newcastle University,
would be stepping into the Associate
Member seat, while Bob Cushing of
Bridge Fibre would take the Business
Associate seat.
David also announced that the current
CEO, Paul Wright, had handed in his
resignation and a process to find a
new executive director would begin.
Recruitment notices will be circulated via
the member network. Paul is to remain
with UKSPA until January. The UKSPA
10 | U K S PA b r e ak t h r o u g h | w i n t e r 2 0 17
Chairman and all members present
showed their appreciation for all of
Paul’s past work. He will be missed.
FROM OUR HOSTS
The conference hosts, John Leake,
Business Development Manager, Sci-Tech
Daresbury, and Malcolm Jackson, Group
Finance Director, Langtree introduced the
Daresbury site. Offering space flexibility
and access to high-tech facilities, this
enterprise zone aspires to support tenant
growth, from hot desk, through scale-up,
to exit. To support this vision, the park
management team offer business support
to help tenants overcome challenges such
as routes to market and access to skills
through strong partnerships with
organisations such as Innovate UK and
Liverpool City Region, as well as strategic
relationships with industry organisations
such as IBM, Hitachi, and Intel.
Carol Treasure, X-Cellr8, gave a
tenant’s perspective. Having initially
made the error of taking on too much
space too soon in an early phase of
company development, X-Cellr8 relocated
to Daresbury four-and-a-half years ago
and now enjoys the confidence of low-
risk scalability.
BIG