Venturing forth
17th October, 2014
AS THE Fastest 50 attests, thinking differently can bring great rewards.
Many of the companies in this year’s list of the North East’s fastest growing privately-owned businesses have built their success on developing products and services which others cannot or do not provide.
Of course, this is not something new for the North East.
The region has a proud history of innovative thinking which has not only helped to drive the economy forward but in many ways has powered the world.
The likes of Joseph Swan, George Stephenson, Robert Stephenson and Lord Armstrong blazed a trail from the North East which spread worldwide and that combination of inventive thinking and entrepreneurial flair is undoubtedly a powerful one.
In more recent times, we have only to look at the achievements of business software giant Sage Group and the exciting cluster of hi-tech companies currently centred around Ignite in Newcastle, Sunderland Software City and Digital City on Teesside to see that this spirit is alive and well.
An important event taking place later this month will hopefully nurture this further and spread the message about the importance of innovation, not just to companies in the technology and software industries but to businesses in all sectors.
Venturefest North East is being staged at the Hilton NewcastleGateshead on October 21 and is a free, full-day event focusing on how businesses can embrace innovative thinking.
Delivered by Newcastle Science City with support from the North East Local Enterprise Partnership and innovation agency Innovate UK, it is specifically designed to bring together businesses, corporates, investors, academics and advisors with specific expertise in innovation.
One of the themes of the event is ‘open innovation’ and various talks, presentations and workshop sessions are aimed at how businesses can collaborate and work together on an open basis, pooling their expertise and ideas to create products and services that they might not be able to deliver just working on their own.
There will also be opportunities for companies and entrepreneurs to pitch their ideas to leading investors and seed funders who specialise in early stage innovative businesses.
Speakers at Venturefest will include representatives from search giant Google, Wyle Group (NASA’s primary life science and medical operations service provider) and innovation charity Nesta.
If you will pardon the plug, I will also be taking part in Venturefest, leading a session looking at ways to commercialise and make money out of ideas.
In addition to this event, there are also moves towards greater collaboration and pooling resources to benefit the North East as a whole.
For example, the Neptune facility in Wallsend is taking shape. Promoted by Newcastle University and part-funded by the North East LEP, the facility will act as a test bed for various pieces of equipment used in the subsea and offshore industry – itself a real powerhouse of the modern North East economy.
The subsea and offshore sector is one of four main areas in which Venturefest is promoting greater collaboration.
Digital innovation, healthcare and low carbon vehicles are the other sectors which will be featured at Venturefest and where the region can harness its existing capabilities and join forces to develop new products and services.
Such open collaboration can often create something greater than the sum of its parts.
However, it does also bring a number of important issues to the fore which need to be resolved in order for success to be achieved.
One of the most important considerations is that if a collaborative process results in a successful product which has a worldwide demand, who takes the credit and therefore the lion’s share of the proceeds from the product’s development?
In a similar vein, if the process results in a product which only has applications in one collaboration partner’s field, how will the other partners be recompensed for the time and expense they have spent on developing it?
And how can your business protect intellectual property which is disclosed as part of the collaboration to other collaborators who are, in many cases, competitors?
Questions like this require specialist legal input to help solve them. In our experience, it is always better to discuss and agree the solutions to these issues at the outset of any collaborative project rather than attempting to reach a deal when something has been developed.
That way, each of the partners involved knows exactly where they stand so there is much less temptation to hide inventions from other collaborators and the practicalities of open innovation can match up to the spirit of the idea.
Alex Shiel
Partner, Head of Intellectual Property
* For more information on the issues raised by this article, please contact Alex Shiel.
Please note that this briefing is designed to be informative, not advisory and represents our understanding of English law and practice as at the date indicated. We would always recommend that you should seek specific guidance on any particular legal issue.
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