WestBIC supports innovators

The West’s official EU-certified Business Innovation Centre has launched a three-year Strategic Plan to harness the full potential of high-end start-up companies across the region.

WestBIC already provides a unique offering to the innovation ecosystem, which is characterised by specialist one-to-one tailored support for those HPSUs and scalable businesses.

And the new plan outlines its three key priority areas for implementation over those next three years.

It firstly aims to drive innovation and provide specialist support, with the aim of growing the number of innovative, export focused HPSUs commercialised annually.

It will also strive to delivering regional impact by working closely with regional partners and stakeholders to animate and support a diverse range of start-ups servicing emerging and growth sectors.

Those sectors embrace women’s entrepreneurship, the blue and green economy, life & health sciences, digital innovation and more.

And it will grow access to investment to ensure that seed and growth capital is available to innovative pre-seed and seed start-ups across the region.

WestBIC’s CEO John Brennan said they were fortunate to work in a really interesting area, ‘with new innovative start-ups coming through the door every week’.

“We get to work with the European BIC network where we meet with European Business Innovation Centres and similar organisations, and we share good practices, learn and impart some knowledge in the European ecosystem too,” he said.

And WestBIC’s Chairperson Gillian Buckley said that their offering was aligned across its strategic priorities with Enterprise Ireland’s strategic ambitions as set out in the EI Strategy “Leading in a Changing World” for the period 2022-2025.

“WestBIC’s strategy also aligns with the priorities of the Western Regional Enterprise plans, which is vitally important from the perspective of balanced regional development,” she said.