The FINANCIAL — Winning innovative businesses gathered at Aston Business School to meet the people behind the INDEX (INovation Delivers Expansion) programme which has provided them each with £3000 worth of innovation from their choice of the region’s 13 universities.
More than 60 small and medium enterprises (SMEs) gathered to learn more about how they can spend their voucher. The INDEX programme has been created to encourage closer working between small businesses and higher education, to help with projects or problems that can be solved with high level thinking, knowledge and innovation. Now in its third round of funding, INDEX has already awarded 140 £3000 vouchers, with a further 80 available up until April 22nd.
According to Aston Business School, the breakfast meeting, hosted by Central ITV News Presenter Llewela Bailey, brought together representatives from the project’s funding bodies including Advantage West Midlands and Economic & Social Research Council with academics and the INDEX project team.
Dr Judy Scully of Aston Business School, who heads up the INDEX Project team said: “We were delighted to see such a wide variety of businesses taking advantage of this excellent opportunity to work with the universities and are pleased that the project is proving so popular with SMEs and with academics. I would encourage any SMEs that have not already applied to visit the website and to get their applications in.”
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