meeting held on 31 October 2006 - Lancaster University

LANCASTER UNIVERSITY
Business Enterprise Board
Minutes of the <strong>meeting</strong> <strong>held</strong> on 31 October 2006
Present: Roderick O'Brien
Trevor McMillan
Steve Riches
Gavin Smith
Jane O'Brien
Mark Bacon
Ellie Hamilton
Gordon Clark
Magnus George
Colin Lambert
Dion Williams
Apologies for absence:
Corinne May-Chahal
Frank Dawes
Sam Chadwick
1. Minutes of last <strong>meeting</strong>
The minutes of the last <strong>meeting</strong> <strong>held</strong> on 16 May 2006 were confirmed.
2. Matters Arising
Trevor McMillan asked that the HEIF allocation breakdown and the new
Business Enterprise Board Constitution be circulated to the members.
3. Strategic Partnerships
Roderick O’Brien gave an overview of the current status on the
University’s strategic partnership.
Rolls Royce are interested in engaging with the Faculty of Science and
Technology in the area of superconductivity. Colin Lambert commented
that there are issues over resource to react to Rolls Royce’s requirements
as the research group in question is fully funded and therefore working at
capacity. Roderick O’Brien commented that working mechanisms could
be explored such as encouraging the company to sponsor a Chair.

The partnership with QinetiQ is developing well.
The University are progressing discussions with the BBC around the
development of Media City in Manchester. Trevor McMillan commented
that a cross-faculty response would be required on the media agenda.
BAE Systems want to develop a cross-faculty relationship.
Trevor McMillan stated that the formal announcement of £6M of funding
for N8 was made on 24 October. £400k will be allocated to developing
business interest in each of the five themes (Critical health issues,
Molecular Engineering, Water, Energy, Tissue Regeneration & Stem Cell
Research), including the appointment of a Business Manager to each
theme, £1.6M will be set aside to support feasibility studies in the five
themes, with the remaining £4M to be utilised to take forward two
themes.
Lancaster University will co-ordinate the Water theme under the
direction of Professor Louise Heathwaite with an involvement from
Dr Mark Bacon. The funding is similar to HEIF in that it is aimed at the
establishment of industrial linkages and is not ‘core’ academic funding.
Other staff involved at the University include Professor Roger Kemp
(Energy), Dr Nigel Fullwood (Stem Cells), Professor Colin Lambert
(Molecular Engineering), Professor David Allsop and the Institute for
Health Research (Ageing).
The Northern Way funding of £6M is for capital projects – for Lancaster
University £750K will be used on the third phase of the Lancaster
Environment Centre and in turn we will vest £750K in a research account
with N8, i.e. cash neutral to the University.
4. HEIF/NWDA
Dion Williams outlined the achievements of University’s HEIF2 initiative
that had ended on 31 July 2006. Overall the initiative was delivered very
successfully with all of the key targets significantly overachieved. The
only target output not achieved was that for Knowledge Transfer
Partnerships although solid foundations have been out in place with a
number of schemes under development with corporate partners and in
the area of Health (supported via Northern Way funding). The initiative
also performed well financially coming within £311 on a £2.4M budget.
The North West Development Agency project that ran alongside the
HEIF2 initiative has been extended with a new end date of 31 March 2007
and a revised budgetary breakdown has also been agreed. The initiative
is progressing strongly with most end target outputs either very close or
already over-achieved.

5. ERDF
The HEIF3 initiative commenced on 1 August 2006. Indicative target
outputs and budgetary breakdowns have been forwarded to each of the
teams that have been allocated funds from this initiative.
Dion Williams outlined that the University had received all of the
expected Offer Letters for the Regional Action Plan projects and that these
were now underway. Our involvement, through the Centre for
Employability Enterprise & Careers, in two further Regional Action Plan
projects is under discussion with the University of Central Lancashire
who are leading on a Graduate Retention and a Graduate Enterprise
initiative. The University has also been awarded further funding from the
Action Plan to extend the activities of the Entrepreneurship for Growth,
InfoLab 21Graduate Academy and DESIRE projects.
Under the North & Western Lancashire Priority 1 Action Plan we have
received the Offer Letter for the Creative Awareness Networks project.
The University is also in discussions with the Action Plan to extend the
Lancaster Business Creation project by a further £50K of ERDF. The
Action Plan has also recently requested expressions of interest from
parties seeking to access further funding – this has been circulated
internally.
The Phase 1 ERDF projects are now all complete following the submission
of final claims after the resolution of the overheads issue. The overall
performance on outputs has been very good with the key indicators
overall over achieved or close to target, with the collection of sales and
jobs results continuing. Two of the projects, Virtual Prototyping
(Engineering – Lancaster Product Development Unit) and InfoLab21,
were nominated by Government Office North West and accepted by the
European Commission as ‘exemplar’ European-funded initiatives for a
Commission conference on best practice in Austria during November
2006. A further initiative, CommIT2 (Lancaster University Volunteering
Unit), has achieved a RENEW North West Award (RENEW is the Regional
Centre of Excellence for Sustainable Communities).
6. Northern Leadership Academy
Magnus George outlined that he is now seconded to the Northern
Leadership Academy. The project is currently commissioning delivery
projects and there is an opportunity for colleagues across Lancaster
University to bid for funds. All bids must align in some way to the
aspirations of the Northern Leadership Academy in that they must be
relevant to the theme of leadership. Overall, the Academy will seek to
have a 2:1 split between spend on private sector and public/community/
voluntary/3rd sector. Private sector activities will see a marked

predominance to support for SMEs. Funding is available to the end of
March 2008 but initiatives that could be delivered by March 2007 would
be welcomed. Funding was available in the range £10-100K and the
University does not need to be the lead partner in any proposal.
Dion Williams commented that this might represent an excellent
opportunity for a number of the outreach teams to secure match funding
towards their ERDF initiatives.
7. HLS Pathfinder
Jane O’Brien outlined the Higher Levels Skills Pathfinder project that is to
be co-ordinated by the North West Universities Association and funded by
HEFCE. The Pathfinder is one of three regional pilot projects that are
formulated around the stimulation of demand from employers for Higher
Level Skills provision from the Higher and Further Education sectors. Jane
O’Brien is co-ordinating the University’s response to this initiative.
The North West Pathfinder centres on two key initiatives – the mapping
of current provisions and creation of a brokerage mechanism, and funding
for the development of new provision that is demand-led. The Pathfinder
focuses on four sectors that are either North West Development Agency
Priority Sectors (Advanced Manufacturing, Creative & Digital Industries,
Financial & Professional Services) or are regionally large employers
(Construction). Any new course provision must be of Level 4 standard
(first year undergraduate) and accredited. Jane O’Brien said that CETAD
have lots of experience in accreditation frameworks and could offer
assistance in this regard.
8. Any Other Business
Magnus George gave an overview of the difficulties that have resulted for
the Management School, in particular with visiting clients, as a result of
the University’s new parking policies. Steve Riches concurred with this
view from an InfoLab21 perspective and stated that a distinction should
be made between visitors and guests. Trevor McMillan suggested that the
situation be given time to settle down in order to get a full perspective of
the long term impact of the new arrangements. A long discussion ensued.
Action: Trevor McMillan to discuss the issues with Andrew Neal
Trevor McMillan asked the Board to note that Lancaster University had
been cited in the Sunday Times Higher Education League Tables for our
interaction with industry.

Trevor McMillan stated that the Vice-Chancellor had reported that the
application of research results through knowledge transfer interaction
might well impact on the current Research Assessment Exercise. It was
further increasingly certain that this would increase in prominence as a
future measure of performance. A discussion ensued on this topic and on
academic incentivisation for knowledge transfer activities.
9. Date of next <strong>meeting</strong>
The next <strong>meeting</strong> of BEB is on Tuesday 28 November at 3.00 p.m. in
InfoLab21.