Medilink Midlands crowns 13 winners at Awards night
The Medilink Midlands Business Awards 2023, sponsored by the University of Birmingham, saw 13 individual life science companies based in the East and West Midlands receive awards from Start-Up to Outstanding Achievement. A further six companies received highly commended certificates.
The awards were held in the historic surroundings of the Great Hall at the University of Birmingham and celebrated by over 220 guests from across the life sciences and professional services sectors.
Medilink Midlands provides life sciences innovation and business support to organisations across the region and has created the awards with the aim of recognising and celebrating businesses in the life sciences sector that have excelled.
The awards were introduced by Medilink Midlands chairman, Professor Martin Levermore, MBE, DL, who said: “We are extremely fortunate to have such diverse life science businesses across the East and West Midlands and tonight we’re able to celebrate their outstanding achievements as part of the Medilink Midlands Annual Business Awards. The next coming years will witness an explosion within our life science businesses propelled by increased FDI into the region. Events such as these Awards are important. They not only raise the profile of the finalists and, of course, the winners, but they elevate the sector and the importance of the Midlands life science ecosystem.”
A welcome address was given by headline sponsor, the University of Birmingham and the Precision Health Technologies Accelerator, Professor Liam Grover, who had this to say about the current status of the sector: “This is an exciting time for the life sciences and medtech sector in the Midlands, with Birmingham ready to take a leading role in driving forward medical innovation. The Medilink Midlands Business Awards show just how many talented, pioneering businesses and individuals we have in the region and it was an honour for the University of Birmingham and Precision Health Technologies Accelerator to sponsor and host them.”
Leading the way were Joint Approach Rehab and iethico, which both scooped the Start-up award, sponsored by The Medical Technologies Innovation Facility at Nottingham Trent University. This award recognises businesses that show huge potential and are, in the judges’ opinion, likely to achieve impressive feats in the future.
Spirit Health and The Tribe Project (By Bronze Software Labs) were awarded Advances in Digital Healthcare, sponsored by digital acceleration company WM5G, for demonstrating how digital technologies could be used to create new ways of delivering healthcare.
It was a busy night for NuVision Biotherapies, who took two awards home. The first, Delivering Innovation in Health and Care Award, was presented by category sponsors and law firm, Shakespeare Martineau; the second was for Partnership between Academia and Business for its work with the College of Health and Life Sciences, Optometry & Vision Science Research Group (OVSRG) at Aston University, and was presented by category sponsor, ARISE at Anglia Ruskin University.
The Export Achievement Award was won by Upperton Pharma Solutions - an early phase pharmaceutical contract development and manufacturing organisation - and featured a video message from award sponsor, City of Mentor in Ohio, USA.
Six organisations were shortlisted for the Innovation Award, sponsored by intellectual property specialists, Barker Brettell, however only two were successful. JointMedica took home the prize for the West Midlands and BlueSkeye AI was the chosen winner for the East Midlands. The companies were selected for their development of innovative technology that has produced major improvement in business and market performance.
The penultimate award, and final category requiring an independent submission, was the Outstanding Achievement Award, which was won by both BPR Medical and Redditch Medical. This award was sponsored by Medilink Midlands Patron and law firm, Mills and Reeve, and recognises achievement which has had a significant or vital impact on the company or market.
The final award of the night was the One to Watch Award. The winners, selected by an independent judging panel from the successful category winners, were Bioxhale and InoCardia, from the West and East Midlands respectively.
All the winning organisations from seven of the categories will be automatically entered in to the Medilink UK National Awards, part of the Med-Tech Innovation Conference & Expo (MTI), which takes place on 7 and 8 June 2023.
The full line-up of winners and highly commended in the 2023 Awards, are:
Start-up, sponsored by The Medical Technologies Innovation Facility at Nottingham Trent University
Winner (East Midlands) - Joint Approach Rehab Ltd
Winner (West Midlands) - iethico
Highly commended - Enrich My Care
Advances in Digital Healthcare, sponsored by WM5G
Winner (East Midlands) - Spirit Health
Winner (West Midlands) - The Tribe Project (By Bronze Software Labs Ltd)
Highly commended- DDM HEALTH
Delivering Innovation in Health and Care, sponsored by Shakespeare Martineau
Winner (East Midlands) - NuVision Biotherapies Ltd
Highly commended - PRIMIS (University of Nottingham)
Highly commended - Joint Approach Rehab Ltd
Partnership between Academia and Business, sponsored by ARISE at Anglia Ruskin University
Winner (West Midlands) - NuVision Biotherapies and College of Health and Life Sciences, Optometry & Vision Science Research Group (OVSRG)
Highly commended - Kimal PLC and University of Birmingham/Mechanical Engineering
Export Achievement, sponsored by Mentor in Ohio, USA
Winner (East Midlands) - Upperton Pharma Solutions
Innovation, sponsored by Barker Brettell
Winner (West Midlands)- JointMedica
Winner (East Midlands)- BlueSkeye AI
Highly commended - BPR Medical
Outstanding Achievement, sponsored by Mills and Reeve LLP
Winner (East Midlands) - BPR Medical
Winner (West Midlands) - Redditch Medical
One to Watch
Winner (East Midlands - selected from Start-up) - Bioxhale Ltd
Winner (West Midlands - selected from Innovation) - InoCardia Ltd