GE Healthcare, a global life sciences company, has today (Monday 27 April) opened the first phase of its Innovation Village in Cardiff; a campus dedicated to growing business and developing technologies and tools for the global life sciences industry.
Opened by Economy Minister Edwina Hart and Kieran Murphy, president and CEO of GE Healthcare Life Sciences, the Innovation Village has already had interest from more than 50 early stage international life sciences businesses since it was announced last month at BioWales 2015.
Based within GE Healthcare’s existing Maynard centre facility in Cardiff, the Innovation Village hopes to support and grow emerging life science businesses and academic spin outs. The global company will help them explore their ambitions to reach international markets, advise them on scaling up manufacturing and potentially partner with them on new innovations that tackle the challenges of health and biotechnology.
GE Healthcare is setting up the Innovation Village as part of its business-wide commitment to embedding a culture of collaboration in its operations. The campus is backed by £367,000 from the Welsh Government’s Open Innovation programme and European Regional Development Funds.
Speaking at the launch, Edwina Hart, said: “GE Healthcare is to be congratulated on its drive to promote Open Innovation and support the growth of innovative young businesses that have the potential to make a real impact on the sector, the economy and the health and well-being of people.
“It offers growing businesses a tremendous opportunity to access the innovation of GE Healthcare Life Sciences’ global ecosystem and benefit from the company’s extensive expertise in all areas of business.
“The life sciences are one of our key sectors and I am delighted that GE Healthcare – one of our anchor companies – is supporting our efforts to grow and expand the sector, helping to make Wales one of the best locations in the UK for life science businesses.”
The first phase of the project is the establishment of a facility that will target businesses working in the life sciences tools and technology sector. GE Healthcare will offer tenants a supported ecosystem for them to develop and commercialise products including access to state-of-the-art scientific and manufacturing equipment, process and supply chain expertise, a global distribution network and access to commercial services.
This initial phase includes laboratories, meeting and office space with room for 12 businesses.
Kieran Murphy, president and CEO of GE Healthcare Life Sciences, said: “We are pleased with the interest shown by small life science companies in joining us at the Innovation Village. Part of GE’s strength is built on 120 years of innovation, and by bringing growing businesses onto our site we can both support their development with our expertise and scale, and potentially access promising new technologies that could complement our own.”
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