Last year, £9.7 million in funding was leveraged by healthcare innovators, through grants and private investment, with the support of the West of England AHSN.
This figure has been released as part of our recent Impact Review 2020-21, demonstrating huge progress in the creation of health and wealth for our region.
The West of England AHSN is one of 15 AHSNs across England that together make up the AHSN Network. The AHSN Network is nationally commissioned by the Office for Life Sciences (OLS) to support the UK health and life sciences sector by accelerating the development and uptake of innovations that can improve patient outcomes, reduce NHS costs, create jobs and generate economic growth.
Investment leveraged across the AHSN Network has increased significantly year on year, going from £322 million in 2019/20 to £462 million in 2020/2021 – a positive contribution to ‘UK PLC’ that far exceeds the £13 million annual funding received from the OLS commission.
Even in this most difficult of societal and economic climates our country has ever seen, the national AHSN Network impact metrics show that we have been able to provide even more support to companies, creating and safeguarding more jobs and bringing in even more investment into our regions.
As a collective network, we have been instrumental in generating £1 billion of investment and almost 3,000 jobs over the last three years.
Commenting on these new figures, Nicola Hutchinson, Innovation Exchange and Economic Growth Director for the AHSN Network and Chief Executive at AHSN North East and North Cumbria, said: “The impact our industry is having both from a patient and healthcare system perspective and supporting UK economic recovery is huge. I am inspired every day by the hard work, creativity and perseverance that the companies and individuals we support continually demonstrate.
“I am also extremely proud of our AHSN teams across the country who have worked their socks off during a very difficult year to help deliver transformative health and care services. Every day our teams support health innovators from idea to implementation, so that they can in turn support our NHS staff and improve the lives of patients.
“It is more important than ever to provide the right kind of guidance to companies who can grow and help our nation to recover from the health, wellbeing and economic challenges we face.”
Nigel Harris, Director of Innovation and Growth at the West of England AHSN adds: “Our specialist business development team understands the local health and care sector needs in this region and knows how to navigate the NHS system. There are funding opportunities available for innovations that could improve patient outcomes and reduce NHS costs. We offer innovators with a wide range of support and we help to ensure that new products align to clinical priorities and requirements.”
If you are a health care innovator looking for business development support and guidance, expert advice, tools and funding opportunities, visit our Innovation Exchange for resources and to make contact with one of our business development team.
For more on our work in transforming lives through innovation across the West of England and the country, read our full impact review here: https://www.healthinnowest.net/impact-review-2020-21/.
Posted on July 8, 2021
