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Commercialisation and Partners

Precision Health Technologies Accelerator (PHTA) Ltd

Find out more about the PHTA

The Precision Health Technologies Accelerator (PHTA), a wholly owned subsidiary of the University of Birmingham, was established in 2021. It currently operates from the ITM but will relocate to the Birmingham Health Innovation Campus in Q4 2024.

PHTA will offer approximately 70,000 square feet of state-of-the-art incubation and collaboration space, making it the University’s flagship health and life sciences research facility. Designed to support businesses in the sector, PHTA features Category 2 wet and dry labs, offices, a Makerspace, and a training suite. These facilities cater to researchers from the proof-of-concept stage to spin-out companies and beyond, providing essential grow-on space for small health innovation businesses.

The Accelerator serves as a hub where entrepreneurs, start-ups, and scale-ups collaborate with the next generation of academic and clinical leaders. This dynamic environment creates unique opportunities to commercialize ideas and accelerate the development of cutting-edge therapies and technologies.

PHTA is also home to the Clinical Immunology Service and the Industry Trials Hub, offering innovators and small enterprises access to expertise, resources, and infrastructure. These resources support the translation of healthcare innovations, including phase I to III clinical trials and real-world evaluations.

Precision Health Technologies Accelerator

Health Innovation West Midlands (HIWM)

Find out more about the HIWM

Health Innovation West Midlands (HIWM)

Health Innovation West Midlands (HIWM) is one of 15 health innovation networks (HINs) across England who work with healthcare organisations and businesses to transform healthcare through the adoption of innovation. The HINs work with partners to support the spread of innovation at pace and scale, to improve services for patients, to enable NHS efficiencies, and generate economic growth at a local, regional, and national level.

Following the HIN 5-year relicense in October 2023, four areas of focus have been developed to support transformational health innovations and accelerate the adoption and spread of improvement solutions demonstrated to deliver patient benefit.

Leading Through Convening
Bringing academia, clinical, and business sectors together to improve healthcare for patients, HIWM partners with several regional assets, including:

  • Birmingham Health Partners
  • WM Health Technology Innovation Alliance
  • WM Cancer Alliance
  • WM Research Delivery Network
  • Research-active universities
  • WM Growth Company
  • WM Applied Research Centre (WMARC)
  • West Midlands Secure Data Environment

Supporting the Workforce of the Future
HIWM provides a number of education programmes in:

  • Wound care
  • Cardiovascular disease (CVD)
  • New technologies
  • Managing deterioration
  • Polypharmacy
  • PSIRF
  • Maternity care
  • Appreciative enquiry across social, primary, secondary, and tertiary sectors

It also offers education and training for NHS and commercial innovators, supporting them to develop their innovations with advice on regulation, IP, commercialisation, funding, and pathway management. Additionally, HIWM provides targeted support for digital, social enterprise, and FemTech innovators.

Delivering Evidence-Based Interventions to Improve Health and Wealth
HIWM utilises the most effective innovations to improve patient care. Working closely with WMARC, HIWM offers:

  • Initial diagnostics for innovators
  • Innovation frameworks for NHS organisations
  • Real-world evaluation services
  • Knowledge mobilisation
  • Deployment frameworks to ensure adoption at pace and scale

Delivery at Pace and Scale
HIWM has developed an Innovation Framework to support innovations from ideation through to wide-scale deployment. Focused on key stages of innovation—discover, develop, deploy—HIWM supports innovators in reducing the current development cycle and helps the NHS adopt evidence-based innovations at pace and scale.

Through embedding posts in major regional assets, HIWM facilitates the development of innovations by identifying:

  • NHS test beds
  • Sources of grant and venture capital funding
  • Regulatory support
  • Safe access to data
  • Academic partnerships

Achievements During 2023-24

  • Supported 446 companies (including 42 internationally)
  • Created 51 new jobs and safeguarded 51 existing roles
  • Facilitated £28 million in economic investment into the West Midlands
  • Conducted eight real-world evaluations
  • Successfully introduced 15 new innovations into clinical settings
  • Introduced 293 healthcare sites in the West Midlands to a national innovation

Notable Projects and Initiatives

  • Point of Care Ultrasound (POCUS): HIWM developed a programme to support nurses and increase understanding of how POCUS can challenge traditional healthcare practices.
  • Environmental Impact of Medicines: Innovation Project Manager Anna Edwards delivered a TedxNHS talk on how medicines harm the environment and ways to mitigate their impact. Her talk has reached tens of thousands of people across the UK and beyond.
  • Managing Deterioration in Care Homes Programme: In November 2023, HIWM’s ‘West Midlands Managing Deterioration in Care Homes Safety Improvement Programme’ was highly commended in the ‘Provider Collaboration of the Year’ category at the 2023 Health Service Journal (HSJ) Awards.

This programme supported 1,679 regional care homes through training and adoption of deterioration management tools, reducing harm associated with deterioration. It enhanced the prevention, identification, escalation, and response to physical deterioration through improved system coordination.

MidTECH

Find out more about MidTECH

Overview

MidTECH is the NHS Innovation Hub for the West Midlands. We assist NHS organisations in discovering, developing, protecting, and commercialising their innovations and intellectual property (IP). Acting as the technology transfer office for the fresh ideas generated within the NHS in our region, our expertise and understanding of the evolving NHS make us a trusted partner in the healthcare industry.

Healthcare professionals within the NHS are constantly innovating to improve care in their clinical areas, hospitals, or the healthcare sector as a whole. MidTECH’s role is to offer tailored expertise to transform these ideas into tangible products and services that benefit the healthcare industry and patients.

Our process includes assessing new ideas, protecting associated IP, and finding commercial partners to bring ideas to market. We also facilitate collaborations between NHS organisations, universities, and industry.

Services

MidTECH offers a wide range of services, from identifying new ideas within NHS organisations to IP protection, training, and funding assistance. Our services include:

  • Idea Assessment
    We assess new ideas submitted either directly by innovators or via their Trust. This includes evaluating novelty, scope for IP protection, workability for commercialisation, and potential adoption across other Trusts.

  • Intellectual Property Protection
    If an idea requires IP protection, MidTECH works with Trusts to secure the best and most comprehensive coverage. This may involve trademark registration, copyright advice, or patent applications.

  • Commercialisation
    MidTECH helps Trusts commercialise their innovations by:

    • Conducting market assessments
    • Evaluating development costs
    • Identifying commercialisation methods and potential routes
    • Leveraging industry contacts to nurture ideas

  • Strategic Partnership
    From medical devices and software to training and process design, we match innovations with the right partners. Our support includes:

    • Legal assistance for agreements such as joint ventures, consultancy arrangements, and development routes
    • Drafting partnership documents to provide peace of mind for all parties

  • Funding Assistance
    MidTECH identifies and secures funding for Trust projects, including:

    • Advising on the best funding sources
    • Supporting applications and funding contracts
    • Managing grants such as Intellectual Property Management Groups (IPMGs)

  • Internal Strategy and Process Development
    We assist Trusts with:

    • IP policies (e.g., ownership of IP, revenue sharing agreements)
    • Setting and achieving commercialisation targets
    • Providing template agreements for Non-Disclosure, Collaboration, and Licence Agreements

  • Training
    To increase awareness of IP and innovation, MidTECH offers educational events and materials. These resources help innovators understand IP protection, development, and how ideas are taken forward.

Contact Information

MidTECH Innovations
Office 09, Institute of Translational Medicine
Heritage Building, Mindelsohn Way
Birmingham, B15 2TH
Email: enquiries@midtech.org.uk
Website: www.midtech.org.uk
LinkedIn: MidTECH Innovations

Central and South Genomic Medicine Service Alliance (GMSA)

Find out more about the GSMA

There are seven GMSAs (Genomic Medicine Service Alliances) across England, with UHB hosting the Central and South Alliance. This Alliance serves Wessex, Thames Valley, and the West Midlands. The GMSA represents a collaboration among four Trusts:

  • UHB (University Hospitals Birmingham)
  • Birmingham Women’s and Children’s Hospital (BWCH)
  • Oxford University Hospitals
  • University Hospital Southampton

The Central and South Alliance works closely with its sister organisation, the CAS Genomics Laboratory Hub (GLH), which is hosted by BWCH. Together, they form the Central and South Genomic Medicine Service.

Purpose and Priorities

The GMSAs, established in late 2020, are tasked with delivering NHS England’s national genomics strategy, Accelerating Genomic Medicine in the NHS. Their priorities include:

  • Embedding genomic medicine into the NHS.
  • Ensuring equitable access to genomic medicine for the communities they serve.
  • Leading genomic medicine into the data and digital revolution.
  • Supporting the translation of research and innovation for patient benefit.

Team

The core team consists of approximately 20 individuals, primarily based in the ITM. This multidisciplinary team includes:

  • Nurses
  • Midwives
  • Pharmacists
  • Medics
  • Administrators
  • Project specialists
  • Coordinators

Additionally, around 50 individuals work on a limited basis, alongside scientific and clinical advisers.

Activities and Projects

The GMSA delivers a range of core activities, including:

  • Training and education
  • Engagement
  • Patient and public involvement
  • Pathway development
  • Quality improvement
  • Data and digital initiatives
  • Research and innovation

Over the past three years, the team has also undertaken national and local projects such as:

  • Lynch Syndrome
  • Sudden Cardiac Death
  • Familial Hypercholesterolemia
  • Pharmacogenomics
  • ctDNA and RNA Sequencing
  • Genomic medicine in Primary Care

Genomic Networks of Excellence (GNoE)

The GMSA has played a significant role in establishing the Genomic Networks of Excellence, a key part of NHS England’s Accelerating Genomic Medicine in the NHS. These eight innovative networks are designed to develop evidence and adoption models for advanced genomic technologies.

The Central and South GMSA:

  • Leads the GNoE on Serious Presentation of Infectious Disease.
  • Co-leads the GNoE on Artificial Intelligence (AI).

Awareness Campaigns and Events

The GMSA actively marks awareness days like Rare Disease Day through campaigns in collaboration with charitable and public sector organisations. These efforts aim to raise awareness of genetic conditions and connect patients to relevant resources and guidance.

The Alliance also hosts a variety of events, both online and in-person. Highlights include webinars led by the Nursing and Midwifery Team on topics such as:

  • Neonatal testing
  • Patient experience
  • Genetic testing for cancer predispositions
  • Lynch Syndrome

These events have seen high levels of participation, supported by a streamlined registration process that makes accessing genomics education more convenient.

Contact Information

Email: GMSAAdmin@uhb.nhs.uk