Next Generation Science Park

The Next Generation Science Park is a 2-year EU-funded project. It aims to develop and implement Good Practices and Regional Policies for how to design and build a Science Park (SP) or a group of Science Parks that supports regional development, facilitates exchange between Industry and Higher Education Institutions (HEIs), provide the facilities to enhance business growth and competitiveness and attracts national and direct foreign investment in the region. SP can facilitate the linkages between public organisations, large companies, SMEs, and university researchers and students by providing a platform for exchange and transfer of knowledge and technology.

How do we do it

The project will involve 5 partner regions which have several interesting ongoing initiatives to share and build on including:

Sachsen-Anhalt (Central Germany)
Vastra Gotaland (Sweden),
Lower Silesia (Poland);
The Tuscany Region (Italy)
West Midland UK. Birmingham City Council is the organisation representing West Midlands.

The project will involve a series of experience exchange workshops in the partner regions. The workshops aim to spread the learning from each region and to further enhance and embed good practices on how to design, manage and inform strategies for regional policy development to support SPs. It involves the testing and implementation of the learning generated.

Key Areas

6 areas have been identified to be of critical importance for any SP that is striving to develop their activities in a beneficial way. These areas are the focal point for the analysis in the Partner regions which will provide answers to questions identified below. The first area is on a regional level, and the following five on an organizational level:

1. How can regional authoritiesstrategically govern a group of Science Parks?

2. How can SPs interact with SMEs in order for them to take active part in SP activities and projects?

3. How can SPs collaborate dynamically with HEIs to support the development of education programs that better meet the demands of society and industry and that enable students to acquire real-world experience as part of their education?

4. How can SPs attract investments from national and foreign companies?

5. How can SPs support the creation of Public Private Partnerships (PPP) with the goal of conducting demonstration projects in an open innovation environment?

6. How can SPs support entrepreneurship, research based start-ups and innovative SMEs through incubation and other means?

Project results will be disseminated through a webpage, a workshop paper series, a final publication, and final conference. The reports aim to document the learning and to also diffuse them to a larger audience, beyond the consortium such as EU conferences.

The project will complement existing business initiatives across the city.

For further information, please contact Suresh Patel on 0121 303 3091 or via email at: suresh.patel@birmingham.gov.uk