Health Innovation Minister champions Birmingham Health and Life Sciences Quarter at launch
This week, Birmingham Health and Life Sciences Quarter held a launch event in the Houses of Parliament, showcasing the region’s outstanding research and innovation capability on a national stage.
The event, led by BHP founding-member the University of Birmingham, was supported by James Frith, Minister for Health Innovation, and hosted by Al Carns, MP for Birmingham Selly Oak. The launch brought together representatives from the NHS, research institutes, industry, investors and parliamentarians.
Birmingham Health and Life Sciences Quarter is a leading UK and international hub for health-related research and innovation. Centred on a square mile to the south of the city, the co-location of University of Birmingham’s Edgbaston campus, the Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham, Birmingham Women’s Hospital, the BioHub and Birmingham Health Innovation Campus, home to the University’s Precision Health Technologies Accelerator, provides the gravitational pull for world-class research expertise.
Slightly further afield, although still in the south of the city, the Birmingham Dental Hospital and the Royal Orthopaedic Hospital complete the set, making the Quarter home to no fewer than six members of Birmingham Health Partners – along with successful health and life sciences companies such as The Binding Site and Nonacus, which both started out at the University of Birmingham and put down roots in the city.
The Quarter bring together academic prowess, top clinical expertise and state-of-the-art research facilities, to create one of the UK’s most exciting life sciences start-up ecosystems. The tight geographic connection fosters collaboration, with the whole research pipeline possible in one place, from discovery science, right through to clinical trials and translational studies. From bench to bedside and back again, Birmingham has it all.
With health and life sciences totalling £1billion in research awards over a five-year cycle, the city is trusted to deliver. However, the real value is proximity and the connections made across the ecosystem, not simply the calibre and breadth of individual research project conducted.
Professor Neil Hanley, Medicine Health and Life Sciences, University of Birmingham, explained: “This isn’t a promise of what’s to come. We already have the capability, we have the outstanding facilities, we have the people, the coming together of academics, clinicians and industry start-ups. Birmingham is already achieving incredible things; world-first trials, one-of-a-kind studies, getting new treatments to patients before anywhere else in the world.”
Birmingham is one of the most diverse and youthful cities in Europe, with a genetic makeup and heritage that mean research findings are representative of patients across the globe. With access to 5 million people in the immediate vicinity, and a super-diverse patient population, research conducted in Birmingham is scalable in the real world.
Located in the centre of the country, Birmingham is well connected by transport links in the UK and beyond. It is also affordable, offering highly competitive rents for lab spaces, considerably lower than other cities with life sciences hubs, and better quality of life for researchers owing to significantly lower cost of living.
Al Carns, Birmingham Selly Oak MP, the constituency home to Birmingham Health Innovation Campus highlighted this strength, saying: “With over 100 languages spoken across the city, Birmingham is home to the youngest, most diverse and most stable population in the UK. That combination matters enormously for health and life sciences. New treatments and technologies need to work for everyone, and too often they are tested on groups that don’t reflect the people who will ultimately use them.
“In Birmingham, researchers and companies can test and trial in a microcosm of the world, with communities who stay put long enough to be part of studies over many years. That gives the city a real advantage, and it is why Birmingham should be at the heart of the UK’s ambitions in this sector.”
James Frith, Minister for Health Innovation – a position that has responsibility for life sciences, research and innovation, medicines and medtech, and NHS data and technology – also spoke at the event. He highlighted the importance of collaborative efforts, the likes of which Birmingham exemplifies, allowing the UK to lead the way in the life sciences. He also endorsed Birmingham’s Health and Life Sciences Quarter as a powerful example of research, clinical expertise and commercial ambition all coming together.
The event itself marks the start of an exciting journey for the Quarter. The convening of the leading academics, clinicians, SMEs and large industry partners ignited conversations that will continue long beyond the launch celebration.
Professor Hanley closed the event by inviting event guests, potential industry partners and interested investors to come and see the Quarter for themselves, stating that “Birmingham is open for business”.