Innovation Programmes
People are our most important asset and are critical to our success. Through providing people with opportunities to develop and learn new skills, we’re creating a culture with research translation and innovation at its core.
The IKC is involved with a number of approaches to innovation and enterprise development:
• We work closely with the medtech industry to understand current and future skills needs and challenges
• We are partners in the Translate MedTech programme, which provides early stage innovation support to researchers across a consortium of six Leeds and Sheffield City Region Universities.
• We co-developed the University of Leeds’ Medtech Futures online programme, which is available through Future Learn
• We support early career researchers who want to develop their innovation skills through providing training, mentoring and hosting secondments.
CDT INNOVATION TRAINING
The IKC supports innovation and entrepreneurial training as part of the taught course modules in the Leeds Centre for Doctoral Training (CDT) in Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine.
This provides students with an understanding of the medical device landscape, product development process and the regulatory environment. It gives students a commercial perspective as many of the seminars are presented by medical technology innovation experts working in the medical devices industry and demonstrates the breadth of employment opportunities after they complete their PhD. More information on the CDT programme can be found on the University of Leeds website.
The Leeds CDT is one of 8 UK centres, focused on healthcare technologies, funded by EPSRC to equip postgraduates with the skills needed to address healthcare challenges that will increasingly become major global issues. Postgraduate students also have the opportunity to undertake placements in industry to gain a deeper understanding of working in industry and broaden their prospects for future employment.
The IKC has hosted PhD students to work on specific projects to understand market opportunity, IP landscape or route to market for technologies it supports. This provides useful information to support development of these new technologies whilst also giving the students valuable experience, enhancing their CV and improving employability.
INNOVATION SUPPORT IN LEEDS AND SHEFFIELD CITY REGIONS
The IKC is the lead partner in the Translate MedTech programme, which provides early stage innovation support through training courses and secondments to researchers across a consortium of 6 Leeds and Sheffield City Region Universities.
MEDTECH ONLINE LEARNING COURSES
The IKC co-developed five free online learning courses with the National MedTech Skills Academy, focusing on medtech. Delivered through the University of Leeds, these are available to anyone and can be completed as a series or as standalone units.
The modules available are:
- Medtech: Trends and product design
- Medtech: Digital health and wearable technology
- Medtech: AI and medical robots
- Medtech: Orthopaedic implants and regenerative medicine
- Medtech: Exploring the human genome
INTERNATIONAL MEDTECH INNOVATION DEVELOPMENT
Through initiatives coordinated by the Royal Academy of Engineering, the IKC has developed strong relationships with Makerere University in Uganda and Moi University in Kenya.
We are leading a capacity and capability study of MedTech and Biomedical Engineering in East Africa funded by Research England (via the Global Challenges Research Fund) with co-investigators from Makerere University and the Uganda Industrial Research Institute.
With Moi University, the IKC is helping to explore and develop plans to establish a postgraduate institute of biomedical engineering as part of a Higher Education Partnerships in Sub-Saharan Africa award project. We are able to apply our experience of working at the interface of academia and the medtech industry to guide our partners in these situations and pass on innovation good practice.
It totally changed my thinking and I think it is necessary for many researchers like me.
Translate MedTech Patient and Public Involvement delegate