Trade Mission will see international collaboration between the Midlands and the USA

Three Midlands companies with links to life sciences along with Medilink Midlands director Keith Widdowson will travel to Mentor, Northeast Ohio with the aim of promoting trade and investment between the Midlands and the USA.

Cresco Innovation, Adamson Jones and Uvamed will join Mr Widdowson with the two regions aiming for greater collaboration and to promote trade opportunities.

An offer to attend a special International Trade Conference was arranged by Mentor, which includes attending the Cleveland Clinic 2018 Medical Innovation Summit.

This follows on from a memorandum of understanding being signed in August this year after similarities and opportunities were identified between the two regions.

Keith Widdowson said: "Medilink Midlands looks forward to encouraging collaboration with Mentor and Northeast Ohio.

"Northeast Ohio is an attractive location for Midlands companies. It provides a real opportunity for businesses to get a low-cost foothold in the largest Life Sciences market in the world.

“The products and services provided by Midlands Life Science companies are in demand regionally, nationally and internationally. By forging relationships and partnerships, Midlands Life Science businesses can grow their operations and satisfy a global demand for regional excellence. We plan to reciprocate Mentor’s offer of a trade mission and will look to set up an opportunity for medtech companies in Ohio to visit the Midlands next year, coinciding with the Med-Tech Innovation Expo in Birmingham in mid-May.”

The City of Mentor is part of a cluster of over 700 Life Science and biomedical companies, including General Electric, Siemens, Philips, Toshiba, Hitachi, and STERIS. Many of the Life Science companies in Northeast Ohio have grown up around the Cleveland Clinic. Research by the Department for International Trade and the Office for Life Sciences (OLS) shows that the UK has the third largest medical technology sector in Europe and the Midlands has the largest regional medtech cluster in the UK.

The delegation will be hosted by their U.S. counterparts from October 22 to October 24.