Overview

The Cambridge cluster is a supportive and dynamic ecosystem where scientists, businesses, clinicians and entrepreneurs converge to co-create the transformative therapies of the future.

In recent years, Cambridge has seen significant economic and population growth*. The challenge ahead is how to future-proof further growth, uphold our contribution to the UK economy and remain a global leader in life science research, commercialisation and innovation.

Turning the ideas at the interface between medicine and technology into reality for the benefit of society will need unprecedented levels of collaboration across disciplines and sectors. To support the University’s ambition to meet this challenge, Connect: Health Tech, a Cambridge University Enterprise Zone , was initiated as a pilot project in 2020 to build interdisciplinary bridges between the life and physical sciences and industry, for the benefit of patients.

This report presents a summary of the challenges we are currently facing and potential solutions, many of which are transferable to other life and physical science hubs. Our aim is to bring value to patients, industry, academia, the NHS, entrepreneurs, start-ups, SMEs and the wider region with implementation of the recommendations in this report. The recommendations are scalable geographically (e.g. across the Oxford – Cambridge Arc and the UK) and across other sectors and research areas (e.g. decarbonisation, sustainability).

* Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Local Industrial Strategy