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Institutional Context
Summary
When Brunel was awarded its Royal Charter in 1966 we were given a distinct purpose. The campus was to be the home of technological education, championing innovation and advancement, and giving the UK the knowledge base it needed to compete on the international stage.
We conceived a brand of education later research, which was overwhelmingly geared towards industry needs. Our ambition was – and is - to equip students for the workplace and to address society’s challenges on a global scale.
We are proud of our record of industry collaboration – most of our externally funded research is collaborative – and our students’ engagement in KE activity, including the successful Co-Innovate programme. https://www.brunel.ac.uk/business/Business-Partnerships/Co-Innovate
Our Vision and Mission: https://www.brunel.ac.uk/about/brunel-2030/our-vision
Brunel 2030 Strategy: https://www.brunel.ac.uk/about/brunel-2030
Institutional context
We operate in a vibrant yet socio-economically challenging part of the UK. West London is both a buoyant economy and an area with significant deprivation. We have Heathrow on our doorstep, yet low levels of business starts and growth in much of West London. We take our role in the local area seriously, and we are working with the local authorities and local business groups to drive and support increased business starts and success. We have a strong record in supporting our award-winning entrepreneurial graduates to set up their own businesses, including through our role in initiatives like CRL and the new Slough Innovation Hub.
We are particularly strong in the following key sectors, all of which are reflected in our education, research and engagement portfolios:
• Automotive and advanced manufacturing
• Energy, water and food
• Digital and ICT
• Healthcare
• Creative and Cultural Industries
Brunel has long had a large portfolio of Innovate UK funded projects, and a large proportion of our research is in collaboration with industry partners. Our income from SMEs is notably the second highest of any university in London, and we are one of only five universities in England to have secured funding from Research England’s UKRPIF scheme for three or more major research capital initiatives; these have leveraged a total of over £60M in industrial co-investment. We are also an EPSRC Strategic Partner.
Brunel has an excellent track record for the successful delivery of innovative industry – university projects. Examples include:
The National Structural Integrity Research Centre (NSIRC), operated in collaboration with TWI, and supported by UKRPIF
The National Centre for Sustainable Energy Use in Food Chains, led by Brunel with 32 industrial partners
The Advanced Metals Casting Centre, in partnership with Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) and Constellium.
Our Co-Innovate programme which supports companies across London to identify, design, develop and test new or significantly improved products, services and systems. Co-Innovate provides companies with creative skills and expertise and access to academic staff and graduates.
Our new External Engagement, Innovation and Entrepreneurship strategy is now being implemented. The new strategy reaches across KE in both education and research, and across all academic areas. Our guiding principles are to truly understand our partners’ needs, and to build mutually-beneficial relationships with them.
Our KE goal is to maximise the global reach and impact of our research and education to make a positive and lasting difference to people’s lives and cultures, our environment and the economy.
Our current strategy is to achieve this through the following priority objectives:
Pursuing research that addresses major societal, cultural and industrial challenges
Actively ensuring that our research is translated into benefits for society and the UK economy
Educating and supporting the next generation of entrepreneurs, innovators and leaders
Engaging and communicating with policy makers, third sector organisations and the wider public to stimulate informed dialogue and discussion
Our response to Covid-19 has included provision of staff, students and reservists PPE, laboratory equipment and facilities, and development of a Coronavirus test and predictive modelling https://www.brunel.ac.uk/about/coronavirus-information-for-the-brunel-community/we-are-brunel.
For further information, please send queries to engagement@brunel.ac.uk
Local Growth and Regeneration
Summary of approach
Brunel is a major employer and contributor to the local economy supporting over 2,500 jobs in Hillingdon and adding just under 6,000 jobs and over £500m per annum to the London economy. We focus on using our academic expertise, facilities, and ability to access funding, to assist people to start new businesses and to help existing businesses to grow through developing innovative products and services. Economic growth and the creation of new jobs is important in regenerating areas of deprivation within West London and beyond. Our work to date has helped to support new businesses and 40 new jobs during the period and we have helped over 800 businesses including 108 collaborations on new products and services during this time.
Aspect 1: Strategy
Strategic ApproachWhilst Brunel’s growth and regeneration activities span local, regional and international geography’s our primary focus is on London and the Thames Valley with significant activity focussed on West London. This geography is within easy reach of Brunel so local businesses and entrepreneurs can access the expertise of our academics and utilise our students on live projects. An important strategic objective is to enhance support for innovation through stronger linkages between business, financial providers and academic institutions.
Pre -COVID-19 the West London economy contributed £35 billion a year to UK GVA, however the sub region performs poorly on a number of indicators of economic success. SME failure is high and the rate of employment growth is noticeably lower for West London than inner London and outside London. The West London Alliance published research in 2015 showing how new starts-ups drive innovation, competition and would contribute to the growth in productivity West London required.
COVID-19 has hit the West London economy hard with an anticipated fall in GVA of 9% and 350k people either furloughed or newly claiming benefits. Brunel has been at the forefront of mobilising Universities in West London to come together to address the need for re and upskilling and ways to generate growth through innovation and entrepreneurship. We have developed programmes including Apprenticeships, internships and a new PGCert in Work Based Learning to deliver against the skills needs of the area, and contributed to the WLA’s Build and Recover Plan.
We have actively provided support to local business during the pandemic including a Webinar series focussed on resilience and recovery. (https://brunelhive.com/webinars/). We are also delivering the Small Business Leadership Programme under our Small Business Charter accreditation.
Many businesses are unaware or unconvinced of the benefits of innovation, and we carried out primary research with London SMEs to build an evidence base. The research indicated that 60% of SMEs were unsure about the support and advice available from Universities, and over a third of SMEs planning to develop new products and services said cost and a lack of technical support was an inhibiting factor. Since 2009 reports such as The Connected University: Driving recovery and growth in the UK economy https://media.nesta.org.uk/documents/the_connected_university.pdf highlighted the importance and potential of building regional clusters for knowledge exchange to meet the needs of business.
The London ESIF Strategy highlights the need to create effective ‘ecosystems’ to enable businesses to make the journey from pre-start, start up to high growth. Our Bridging the Gap programme has been designed to provide integrated, flexible and tailored support to meet the challenges and needs of new entrepreneurs.
Over the last decade, London’s annual net business start-up rate has averaged 1.7% compared to 1% for the UK as a whole; however, London has the lowest five-year business survival rate of all UK regions. Bridging the Gap supports and develops entrepreneurs during the critical set-up period, with a particular focus on women entrepreneurs as highlighted by the Burt report (https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/inclusive-support-for-women-in-enterprise-the-burt-report )
Our strategy is focussed on delivering support for entrepreneurs and scale-up businesses at the Central Research Laboratory (CRL) in Hayes and the Slough Innovation Hub, providing advice and guidance to potential start-ups through the Bridging the Gap project and providing business and innovation and product design support to SME’s in London through our Co-innovate program.
Aspect 2: Activity
Brunel has focussed on utilising its academic know how, facilities and networks to provide information, advice, mentoring and support to entrepreneurs, start-ups, scale ups and SME’s in developing new products and services and growing jobs. Our activity is in response to needs identified by ourselves, local and national government and other organisations as set out in Aspect 1.
We have delivered our programmes through accessing funding from the GLA and ERDF and matching this with academic time in order to deliver real value for our external customers /collaborators. There are three main projects which deliver aspects of our strategy:
Co-Innovate
Central Research laboratory (CRL)
Bridging the Gap (BtG)
Co-innovate was established in 2012 and was initially was scheduled to last for two years. A second tranche of activity was funded and is scheduled to finish in 2023. This second programme is called Co-innovate Journeys and aims to engage with 240 SME’s and generate 120 in-depth collaborations.
Our aim is to improve access and accelerate the transfer of knowledge and research expertise from Brunel University London to SMEs in London; introducing a dynamic range of activities to support new product and service development leading to business growth for the participating companies and regional economic and employment benefits.
Further information is available at https://www.brunel.ac.uk/business/Business-Partnerships/Co-Innovate/Journeys
‘Making the Future’ was the working title of a proposal which became the Central Research Laboratory (CRL). A partnership between property developer U + I and Brunel, the project had a bold ambition to facilitate and support economic growth through creating an open and integrated innovation eco-system that promoted sustainability and was internationally engaged. It is designed to spawn a maker community, developing a new generation of products and product-related services through the adoption of green technologies whilst providing learning opportunities for students.
The project brings together innovative manufacturing, design, sustainable development and entrepreneurship in a new, custom-built facility - the CRL - at the Old Vinyl Factory, Hayes. The CRL, based at the former EMI site, forms a key part of a project spearheading the regeneration of Hayes which is an area of social deprivation within the London Borough of Hillingdon.
The CRL provides a range of facilities including access to three dedicated prototyping workshops, presentation spaces, meeting rooms, an onsite cafe and a photo studio to compliment the desk space. The CRL is a community of makers, innovators and entrepreneurs who support each other and benefit from a community knowledge tool and drop-in sessions with experts and investors. Technicians help to pass valuable prototyping and materials knowledge to the community and possess skills that are becoming difficult to access for London-based start-ups. The highly-successful Accelerator Programme is the longest continuously running programme of its kind and is now on its seventh cohort. This provides additional access to funding, mentors and experts as well as a unique opportunity to visit China to seek out production partners. Our activity at CRL has just been boosted by a £1.6m Research England grant to expand its activities into the Digital sphere.
More information about the CRL is available at:
https://www.centralresearchlaboratory.com/
The final regeneration- focussed project to highlight is Bridging the Gap (BtG). Also funded by ERDF, and part of the Co-innovate, Bridging the Gap aims to increase the quality of graduate start-ups by providing a support ecosystem enabling entrepreneurs to use the university’s knowledge, expertise and networks to develop, launch and operate companies. The project provides support to enable entrepreneurs to develop concepts into business-ready ventures. BtG provides diagnostic and development support to nurture entrepreneurs and to take product ideas from concept to commercial realisation. The project aims to increase the participation of women and intends to deliver support to 30 Enterprises, 25 New Enterprises and to create 15 Jobs. The project will develop 10 Collaborations and assist the introduction of 10 “New to the Firm” Products.
BtG targets three groups of stakeholders:
Final year students at Brunel
Brunel alumni
Final year students and alumni from Brunel’s CRL and consortium partner universities (Kingston University, RCA, Birkbeck, University of London, University of West London and Westminster University).
The project is designed to increase participation of women from current low levels within STEM orientated subjects and start-ups. The woman centric approach is built into each of the five pillars of the BfG framework through specific activities and goals.
The overall aim of Bridging-the-Gap is to stimulate and enable high quality graduate start up and spin outs from Brunel and our partner universities through developing the entrepreneurial potential and mindset of target beneficiaries leading to the creation of business start-ups with a greater potential to succeed. The framework features five pillars which deliver the key components of the beneficiary journey including:
Access to an on-line platform which provides a space for entrepreneurship information and dissemination of information about individual’s business concepts.
5c’s innovation training delivered by a combination of Brunel academics and supplementary expertise
Pitching and communication including a sequence of pitching opportunities for beneficiaries through an annual cycle, building up to a formal pitch opportunity to the CRL.
Mentoring by Mentors drawn from the Brunel Innovation Ecosystem and tailored to the business opportunity. The focus on women is emphasised by ensuring an equal balance of women mentors. Brunel has considerable experience of encouraging and supporting female career paths through the Brunel Women in Engineering programme.
Access to the Brunel Innovation Ecosystem which provides a basis for marketing and promotion to potential entrepreneurs and generating a panel of experts with interests in contributing to the mentoring programme and pitch events.
You can find further information about Bridging the Gap here:
https://www.brunel.ac.uk/business/Business-Partnerships/Co-Innovate/BRIDGING-the-GAP/Home-page
Aspect 3: Results
The Co-innovate programme has been successful in meeting its targets of SME engagement and industrial collaboration. The scheme also has targets for developing new products and creating jobs. Currently the programme is mid-cycle (2017-2023) and therefore there are no published evaluations however the fact that ERDF committed to continue to fund Co-innovate Journeys and Bridging the Gap demonstrates its effectiveness. The current programme objectives are to engage with 190 SMEs and to deliver 108 collaborative projects. The scheme aims to deliver five new product developments and to create five new jobs within SMEs as a result.
The book of case studies from phase one can be accessed here:
https://www.brunel.ac.uk/business/Documents/150528-Co-Innovate-Book-Final-Copy.pdf Although the examples are taken from outside the reporting period, the book provides examples of how the programme has contributed to specific SME’s and industrial sectors whilst also showcasing the contribution to the wider innovation landscape within London. It is good representation of the work which is currently taking place.
The Bridging the Gap project’s objectives (2017-2023) are to support 30 Enterprises, 25 New Enterprises and to create 15 Jobs. The project will develop 10 Collaborations and assist the introduction of 10 “New to the Firm” Products.
Current performance across both projects combined is captured in the chart below and it can be seen that the targets are acheivable by the project end date.
| 2017-2023 | |||
|---|---|---|---|
Individual Targets |
Total Targets | Total Achieved to date | Total Variance |
| Businesses assisted | 460 | 190 | 270 |
| Non-financial support | 460 | 190 | 270 |
| New enterprises supported | 17 | 5 | 12 |
| Employment increase | 40 | 4 | 36 |
| New collaborations | 220 | 108 | 112 |
| New to firm products | 22 | 5 | 17 |
Our work with SMEs has recently been recognised through the award of the Small Business Charter (https://smallbusinesscharter.org/the-award/)
The Central Research Laboratory (CRL) has proven extremely successful. The original proposal described a project with a bold ambition to facilitate and support economic growth through creating an open and integrated innovation ecosystem that promotes sustainability and is internationally engaged. The project has exceeded these objectives and has proven to be a catalyst not just within the region but to have led to plans for the development of a UK-wide network of such centres. In November 2018 Plus X Holdings Ltd was created and funded to build a network of 5 innovation centres across the UK in the next 5 years. Over 2100 businesses have interacted with the CRL during the period of the project with 343 start-ups and early stage businesses using the facilities up to January 2020. The support and facilities provided by CRL are clearly making a difference as worldwide survival rates for new start-ups achieve around 10% whereas the CRL cohort survival rate is currently 80%. Notably, 50% of Cohort 5 of the CRL programme were female-led enterprises. We have seen an increase in job creation within CRL linked with the success of CRL businesses in attracting funding. We anticipate creating more than the 50 jobs targeted for 2021/22.
For further information, please send queries to engagement@brunel.ac.uk
Public & Community Engagement
Summary of approach
Brunel takes seriously its place at the heart of the local community and impact on wider society. Our dedicated Engagement Strategy details our local community work with civic organisations such as the NHS, local authority and voluntary groups and how we involve the public in research.
We recognise we have a duty to engage the public in a mutually beneficial dialogue about our work and make the University accessible to all.
Brunel aims to improve the economic, social and cultural wellbeing of society. It does so through inspiring local children to aspire to University; working in partnership to solve society’s greatest challenges through research or contributing to civic society through volunteering our expertise and facilities to meet the Community’s needs.
Aspect 1: Strategy
Brunel has always been an institution firmly engaged with the wider world. Whether by producing graduates ready for their future careers, well equipped for the world of work, or by pursuing research addressing major societal challenges, we ensure that our academic activity benefits society. Indeed, this is actually encapsulated in our Royal Charter.
Brunel’s dedicated External Engagement Strategy sets out the University’s key areas of strategic focus which are:
Civic engagement
Public engagement with research
Business engagement
The strategy for external engagement aims to establish priorities and activities for realising Brunel’s vision, mission and values in the particular context of its interactions with wider society. For this purpose, we define external engagement as the myriad of ways in which the activity and benefits of higher education and research can be shared with the public. Engagement is by definition a two-way process, involving interaction and listening, with the goal of generating mutual benefit.
Action plans support each key theme and a dedicated team, the Engagement Strategy and Support Unit, supports the development and delivery of the strategy and co-ordinates the activity across the University.
Our commitment to civic engagement is set out not only in the existing activities we undertake with our local community but is enshrined in our signing the Civic University Commission’s pledge.
Public engagement with our research, be that with industry, patient groups or the general public has always been a key aspect of Brunel’s way of working from our formation in 1966. We believe that true Public Engagement is a two-way process where the public and the University can come together for the benefit of society, be that locally, regionally or globally, through contributing to our research and engaging in a wider dialogue which can help shape what we do. We have worked with the National Co-ordinating Centre for Public Engagement (NCCPE) to develop our strategy since 2016.
Aspect 2: Support
Public Engagement at Brunel is supported by a three-strong central team called the Engagement Strategy Support Unit (ESSU) plus six engagement focussed colleagues within the central and research events teams and a specific departmental lead within Health and Life Sciences. Brunel has an Academic Champion for Public Engagement who leads on championing public engagement activity within the academic community and undertakes high profile external engagement activities to inspire others.
The ESSU has a dedicated Intranet section which provides support, information and advice to colleagues about all aspects of the Engagement Strategy and public engagement, signposts external and internal resources and highlights relevant training opportunities. The intranet also hosts detailed information about the strategy and relevant action plans.
An internal mailing list of staff with an interest in public engagement is maintained. This list is given priority information about training opportunities available and members are signposted to both internal and external funding calls for public engagement activity.
A wide range of training opportunities are made available to staff on engagement techniques, including the use of social media and writing for non-academic audiences. NCCPE has provided specific public engagement training to our academic staff.
Seed funding is available annually for those academics, and PHD students, who wish to undertake public engagement activity which would otherwise not be funded. The scheme, the Public Engagement Fund, is an annual competitive call for public engagement proposals with up to six projects funded each year since the scheme’s inception in 2016. Ranging from a water flume used for demonstrating coastal flood mitigation schemes to school children to interventions for patients recovering from cardio-vascular issues, examples of the types of projects funded can be found here: https://www.brunel.ac.uk/about/public-engagement/pdf/Public-Engagement-Fund-2016-17.pdf
Critical to embedding public engagement is the sharing of best practice. We achieve this amongst our academic community through showcasing high-quality public engagement activities and through the provision of high-profile recognition schemes for those who undertake such work. In June 2020 Brunel launched its inaugural research impact and public engagement awards. Our plans for future years include combining NCCPE’s expert-level training with high profile lectures and an awards ceremony to showcase Brunel’s public engagement. This annual event will ensure public engagement at Brunel is both high quality and ever evolving. An equally important aspect of recognition is that public engagement work forms part of published promotion criteria at Brunel.
Aspect 3: Activity
During the Pandemic in 2020 Brunel staff and students responded to the needs of the local community like never before. Ranging from providing staff, students and reservists to front line health care; PPE, laboratory equipment and facilities to the NHS and Care Sector to the development of a Coronavirus test and predictive modelling for local hospitals, Brunel responded to the needs of its local community. You can view our contribution, including our assistance for local businesses, at https://www.brunel.ac.uk/about/coronavirus-information-for-the-brunel-community/we-are-brunel.
In normal times Brunel focusses on sharing expertise and facilities for the benefit of the local community and region. In particular we look to mobilise our resources to add to the economic, cultural and health outcomes of our community in partnership with the local authority and others. An overview of the kinds of activities undertaken can be found at https://www.brunel.ac.uk/about/civic-engagement/Initiatives.
Our initiatives include Brunel Volunteers where staff and student volunteers contribute 16,125 hours to 61 local charities each year. We undertake 39 events including Good Deeds Day annually.
Brunel is the venue for Junior Citizen where our facilities are used by the local authority, and emergency services, to demonstrate safety issues to young children. Featuring real safety scenarios, over 4000 children from 60 schools visit our purpose-built STEM Centre during the three-week event.
Our impact on education within the local area is profound, both through the provision of trainee teachers and educational policy support and aspiration-raising work with schools (see www.brunel.ac.uk/schools). Each year around 41,000 school children visit our campus or are visited by our teams with a particular focus on encouraging the study of STEM subjects.
Brunel contributes significantly to local arts and culture providing a programme of free concerts and classes throughout the year as can be seen here: https://www.brunel.ac.uk/life/get-involved/brunel-arts. Brunel also curates and delivers the Hillingdon Literary Festival (https://www.hillingdonliteraryfestival.com/) bringing famous writers to the borough and an audience of 600 people.
Health is a key focus where Brunel works closely with local health trusts both in providing qualified health professionals and also as part of a strategic health partnership, The Brunel Partners Academic Centre for Health Sciences (BPACHS). The partnership between Brunel and the Hillingdon and CNWL Health Trusts’ aims to revolutionise the way health and social care is delivered in the community as well as providing a platform to develop and implement multi-disciplinary research. Our aim is to translate care into the community, and to deliver new health education to medics, nurses and allied professions which trains a workforce equipped to deliver integrated care. Full details are available here: https://www.brunel.ac.uk/about/chls/brunel-partners-academic-centre-for-health-sciences. Partnership working is key to Brunel’s Brunel 2030 strategic vision (https://www.brunel.ac.uk/about/brunel-2030) and in health this has expanded to include a highly ambitious plan to build an entirely new Polyclinic for Hillingdon on university land, designed with the latest in clinical practice in mind and very much integrated with the teaching and research from Brunel, including our new Medical School.
It is of course important for Brunel to share its’ work with the community and our Public Engagement programme reaches out, both to particular interest groups and to discuss with the wider public the big issues that confront society. We have web pages dedicated to public engagement (https://www.brunel.ac.uk/about/public-engagement) which outline many of our public facing activities. The Public Engagement Fund has supported many projects focussed on the local community from Alzheimer’s awareness in schools, through specific health interventions and BORG, the Brunel Older People’s Reference Group which for ten years has been providing feedback on research on the elderly including wellbeing and loneliness. We are also a major contributor to ‘The Conversation’, an independent source of news and views, sourced from the academic and research community and delivered direct to the public. We have published 200 articles on The Conversation, with over 2.5m reads.
Brunel provides many ways for the public to access its work either on campus or digitally. Our research repository BURA can be accessed by anyone at https://bura.brunel.ac.uk/ and we have a physical archive of special collections which can be accessed by the public (https://www.brunel.ac.uk/life/library/Special-Collections).
Our annual public lectures are popular and are live streamed so that they are available to all. Dealing with societal challenges, the events focus on contemporary issues relevant to everyone.
Brunel produces a digital “What’s On Guide” for subscribers which shares news and information about our activities and enables the public to book events online.
Aspect 4: Results and learning
It is standard practice across all civic and public engagement activities to gather feedback, enabling changes to be made to future activities. Data is also gathered on attendance at events such as public lectures, summer schools and other engagement activities and these data form part of the annual HEBCIS return. It is possible therefore to see trends of attendance and to see if new audiences are being attracted to campus from registration data.
Many public engagement activities also invite further participation from the public such as our young person and older person’s research reference groups. This enables direct public participation into our research activities in order to influence not just the type of research conducted but also how that research is communicated and the use of audience-appropriate language.
Digital activities such as our website and digital newsletters offer obvious opportunities to directly track interest from the public through data analytics which measure:
Page visits and repeat page visits
Popularity of certain content
Time spent on specific content
Individual navigation journeys through the site
These enable us to monitor and adapt our web content periodically to ensure we are meeting customer needs.
After initial editions of the What’s On Guide were emailed we asked our 771 subscribers to complete a survey to see what they thought of the look and feel of the Guide and its content. Critically we were able to ask whether the recipient’s perspective of the university had changed due to this new initiative. The results from the survey showed that:
91.4% rated the Guide either ‘Good’ or ‘Excellent’
51.4% booked an activity as a result of receiving the Guide
94.3% said the Guide has made them more aware of the things that the University can offer the community
Over 60% said the guide made them feel more favourable towards the University
By monitoring “click-through” the guide also provides direct feedback on the popularity of events, services, and even University news items, in real time. This shows that investing in digital communication with the community is not only useful to the public but also provides valuable insights into community perceptions of the University and indeed can impact those perceptions.
Aspect 5: Acting on results
University community and public engagement activities are led by our Vice-Principal ensuring a high profile. Regular events and senior staff meetings offer opportunities to gain input to our strategy and to highlight successes. Our annual research and engagement awards and competitive Public Engagement Fund help raise standards and share best practice.
Participating in external committees, such as the local authority’s Hillingdon Partners Committee, enables us to share and gain feedback on our community activities from a wide range of third sector and community stakeholders. The university is an associate member of the Uxbridge Business Improvement District which provides similar opportunities.
The university is active in other spheres such as playing a leading role in West London Business and the local chambers of commerce ensuring we understand the issues affecting local businesses of all sizes.
Brunel has taken a lead role in galvanising the universities of West London to work closely with West London Business and the West London Alliance (comprising the seven West London Boroughs) to develop a detailed understanding of the needs of our community in re-building the local economy.
For further information, please send queries to engagement@brunel.ac.uk