Updates
Promoting Bristol at The House of Commons
Yesterday I spoke at an event in The House of Commons, a reception for Bristol and the West of England for MPs, press, government employees etc, aiming to highlight the important role that the Bristol and West of England economic area has to make to driving economic recovery. So here's what I said, as the creative industries representative (without the joke about being Liam Fox's warm up girl):
Bristol is home to a myriad of exciting and innovative creative companies and individuals, from the household names like Aardman, BBC Natural History Unit, IMDB, Massive Attack and Portishead to digital agencies like Enable and E3, TV producers like Icon and Tigress, product designers like Trunki and publishers like Sawday.
In addition, Bristol’s silicon sector – the biggest outside of California – consists of over 40 innovative companies – fuelling the growth of the digital technology sector and attracting international companies such as Hewlett Packard and Toshiba to carry out cutting-edge research in the city.
The World Economic Forum recently developed a ‘heat map index of 100 creative environments combining innovation talent, a culture of collaboration and a willingness to source ideas from outside the usual boundaries. It identified Bristol as a hot spring of innovation, a small but growing hub that has already proved itself on the world stage. In other words Bristol is gaining momentum across the world as a place where things can happen.
And it is this sense of open-ness, ambition and action that excites me about the city as a place to live and do business.
Two years ago Watershed set up The Pervasive Media Studio, a research lab set in the heart of the city (rather than a university or corporate campus) dedicated to bringing together tech companies, agencies, academics, artists and startups to look at the future of mobile and wireless media.
Set up in partnership with HP Labs, the Regional Development Agency and the University of West of England, in the first 18 months of operation we worked with the Technology Strategy Board, South West Screen, private companies and brands to leverage business in excess of 1.4 million pounds. Projects have been shown in New York, Korea, Brazil and China. We have worked with brands like Vauxhall and The Gorrillaz, companies including Ogilvy and Microsoft and explored diverse areas from the future of theatre to new business models.
The city’s brilliant mix of independent spirit and embedded collaboration, its willingness to think outside of funding silos and embrace opportunity wherever it arises, is what makes Bristol economically vibrant and internationally distinctive – and I believe we have only just started - there is much potential left to tap into and join up.