Putting Scottish Health Innovation on the Map – The Scottish Life Science Awards





On Thursday 3^rd February I was lucky enough to attend the annual Scottish Life Science Awards at the Edinburgh Conference Centre. The event was hosted by Scottish Enterprise who realise the value of the £3bn annual Scottish life sciences industry to Scottish economy and who are fostering trade and export links to drive Scottish product in this area globally – including to USA, China and Korea.

A bit of context:

The Scottish life sciences sector is worth £3 billion annually and is growing at a rate of 8 per cent per year. Scotland is ranked in the top five regions globally for biotech companies and has emerged as a world leader in many fields.


• 71 per cent of the life science organisations based in Scotland are focused on human healthcare, including drug discovery and development.
• Scotland has one of the most sizeable life sciences clusters in Europe, with a significant multinational presence in research, development and manufacturing. 
• 20 new life science companies started trading in Scotland during 2007, while an increasing number of corporate spin outs demonstrate the maturity of the sector.
• World-renowned researchers such as Professor Sir Ian Wilmut and Professor Sir Philip Cohen are based in Scotland.

 

Highlands and Islands Enterprise (HIENT) invited me to attend, having themselves attended the Mobile Healthcare Industry Summit in 2010. Our work overlaps considerably with their own P4 Digital project (realising healthcare which is preventative, participatory, personalised, and predictable), which is gaining ground in Scotland and beyond. Among the 800 strong attendees at the awards ceremony who braved the 100mph recorded winds and whipping rain on the evening were the following dynamic group at the two HIENT tables:

Dyan Berry - HIE - Marketing and Comms Coordinator
Mike Biddle - Technology Strategy Board - Innovation Platform Leader -
Assisted Living
Morven Cameron - HIE  - Head of Research
Neil Campbell - Red Cherry Marketing  - Founder
George Crooks - NHS 24  -  COO
Steven Dodsworth - HIE - Head of Life Sciences
Andrew Fowlie - NHS Grampian  -  General Manager (MCHSCP)
James Gibbs - UHI - Head of Development and Enterprise
John Gobron - Microsoft  - Director, HSG Sales UK
Campbell Grant - Sitekit - Managing Director
Dave Kelly - Albasoft  -  CEO
Moira MacKenzie - Scottish Government  -  Telecare Programme Manager
Irene McAra-McWilliams  - Glasgow School of Art - Head of School of
Design
Nicola McLaughlin - Vodafone - Category Marketing Manager, Public Sector
Elaine Mead - NHS Highland - Chief Operating Officer
Rowan Norrie - True North Innovation - Founder
Alex Paterson - HIE - Chief Executive
Selly Saini  - LifeScan - Early Phase Development   
Nicola Thomas - Vodafone



It was great to see such a diverse set of people in discussion bringing multi-disciplinary approaches to the keen issues in health and how working together may help – from 24 hour online assistance and user-friendly web, to patient behaviour change methodologies, to innovative new medical devices. There was a real buzz and excitement about projects taking off and possible collaborations we may have planned in the next few years. Watch this space on that front.

Nicola Sturgeon, Health and Wellbeing

  

Nicola Sturgeon, Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Health and Wellbeing, gave an optimistic speech on the future of health innovation and investment in Scotland and the buoyant spirit was continued by Hugh Griffiths of Bioenvision (now of NuCana Biomed) who set up his pharmaceutical company in Scotland because of the legacy of health innovation and infrastructure which was supportive there (think Penicillin, Genetics and CAT scan major developments) – he launched his anti-leukemia drug on a minimal figure around £20m and within 5 years had sold the business for around £350m, with listing complete on NASDAQ. The drug was able to turn a 5 year old girls' 1 week life expectancy around to remission status in just 5 days. Griffiths called for better facilitation for clinical trials to engage with eager members of the public, and for business incentives to stick with Scotland as home of life science HQs. It was also an honour to see Sir Ian Wilmut (the English embryologist and currently Director of the MRC Centre for Regenerative Medicine at the University of Edinburgh, or best known for being leader of the research group that in 1996 first cloned a mammal from an adult somatic cell, a Finnish Dorset lamb named Dolly!)

The genetic scientist behind ‘dolly the sheep’ collect an award for outstanding contribution to the growth of Scottish Life Sciences . Technology, telemedicine and innovation were order of the day – attending the event has certainly confirmed my belief in Scotland, like Ireland, Finland, Boston, West Coast USA as one of the hubs driving health innovation and in particular remote  and self health management.....

Thanks again to HIENT