Norfolk and Suffolk Council for Digital Tech - Minutes

Chair: Julian Munson

Date: Thursday 30 September 2021 Time: 10:00-12:00

Videoconference (Teams)

Present

Neil Miles, Inawisdom

Julian Munson, New Anglia LEP (Chair)

Catherine Richards, New Anglia Colleges Gp.

Lisa Roberts, New Anglia LEP

Chris Sargisson, Norfolk Chamber

Sarah Steed, Norwich University of the Arts

Eoin Marsh, Tech Nation

Tim Robinson, Tech East

James Allen, New Anglia LEP

Viv Gillespie, New Anglia Colleges Gp.

John Fagan, Scribe / Sync Norwich

Apologies

Marlon Bowser, HTK

Chris Starkie, New Anglia LEP

John Dugmore, Suffolk Chamber

James Duez, Rainbird

Dominic Keen, Britbots

Dean Withey, Ubisend

Steve Kierney, Epos Now

Ellen Tilney, Norwich City Council

Peter Brady, Orbital Media

John Nicholson, West Suffolk College

Lisa Perkins, BT

Jai Raithatha, Suffolk County Council

Anette Gilham, Ipswich Borough Council

Roberta Willner, Norfolk County Council

Welcome and apologies

JM welcomed everyone to the meeting and noted apologies received.

Progress update against the four core workstreams (Tim Robinson)

Delivered by:

Communications:

• Tech UK’s ‘Local Digital Capital Index’ ranked regions by skills, digital adoption,

infrastructure, R&D, finance and investment, and trade. East of England came out

second behind London.

• Shaping HMG regional tech policy.

•

5G HPO refresh and international opportunities - pushing out to DIT networks.

Noticing more international opportunities. Concept for tech hubs in Asia-Pacific.

• As a region, need to fight quite hard to be heard in all of that noise.

Hubs for innovation:

• Well into the Connected innovation programme which knits together the various

hubs, incubators, and clusters together.

• Holding the second event on 20 October on underpinning technologies and what they

bring for a wide range of sectors.

• Expanding range of innovation hubs with more hubs coming online - EpiCentre,

Innovation Labs model expanding beyond Stowmarket (Sudbury, Woodbridge),

Akcela (new mini-incubator based in Norwich).

Access to support programmes and finance:

• Noticeable successes recently (e-surgery has got into Tech Nation’s Applied AI

programme and Upside (fintech app) has got into Techstars, one of the world’s

largest accelerators.

• Mergers & Acquisitions: Some exciting opportunities coming out of recent mergers

and acquisitions such as FX Home and EO Charging.

• Dialogue continues with a whole a range of key agencies - Tech Nation, DIT, British

Business Bank, Innovate UK, Catapults, etc.

Skills and talent:

• New digital skills centres opening between September and November.

•

8 ICET short courses for SMEs range from UoS - product management, data

analytics, digital marketing, leadership, etc.

• Institute of Technology bid in went in. Waiting to see whether this has been a

success or not. If it is successful, this will mean a dramatic improvement to the

provision of and access to L4 and above courses.

• Digital Skills Task Force reconvening in Q4. One of first tasks will be to figure out

how to mitigate the noise factor and make the most of opportunities out there for

businesses. Lot of noise e.g., bootcamps, kickstart, short courses, etc.

Sarah Steed informed Council members that the decision on the Institute of Technology bid

has been delayed due to the Cabinet reshuffle. Norwich University of the Arts has bid for

funding to deliver three short courses focused at Levels 4 and 6 for learners who might have

good latent digital skills and need to pivot their career.

Catherine Richards mentioned the challenges around flexible starts and the need for

January starts on top of September starts.

ACTION: The skills sub-group will look into this issue working with Catherine.

Delivered by:

Renewal Plan Workshop (Julian Munson & Lisa Roberts)

Lisa Roberts:

• A lot has changed over the last few years with the pandemic, EU Exit and need to

address climate change.

• Taking stock and adapting actions identified in recent strategies to ensure they are fit

for purpose.

• Not creating a new strategy, will be an evolved plan merging those strategies into

one.

• During development, partners agreed that vision and strengths stand true, but

actions and interventions needed updating.

• Region’s response to Government’s Build Back Better Plan.

• Will look at medium and long term and interventions required now to deliver that.

• This sector underpins the Norfolk and Suffolk economy and will play a vital role in the

economic recovery and transition to net zero.

• Today is the last engagement session day. Will test Plan emerging in November.

• Publishing the Plan in January.

Julian Munson asked the following questions:

1. What does an ambitious future look like for the ICT digital sector in Norfolk and

Suffolk and what specific opportunities are there?

2. What are the key strategic interventions that are needed in order to help us get

there? What are the major barriers - skills, finance, infrastructure, business

space?

Tim Robinson:

• When we talk about tech clusters, there are two kinds emerging - clusters that are

massive and very broad, often based in capital cities or Silicon Valley; and then the

more focused clusters that tend to be more specialised.

• South Wales for example has a real focus on cyber security; AI and machine

learning; and semiconductors.

• Locally, Sync the City has recently had more of a focus around Net Zero and we

have an HPO (DIT high potential opportunity proposition) that focuses on 5G.

• It is still possible to have a broad focus in local places to support local businesses

and have a more targeted focus.

• In response to a question on what the sub-sectors should be, this depends on

government announcements for example we have quantum computing capabilities,

but no start-ups. We have strengths in the payment element of Fintech, which is

important and growing.

• The public sector and bodies such as Tech East could pick five or six capabilities to

focus upon and then we would need to ensure all we do in the support environment

genuinely supports those areas.

John Fagan:

• Cannot have a distinctive identity for the sector across Norfolk and Suffolk, it must be

specific to certain locations.

• Need to find some top companies and double down on them. For example, at one

point Norwich had 6-7 EdTech companies which could have been supported.

Delivered by:

Sarah Steed:

• There is a real opportunity around delivering net zero through digital creative

production. We have all sorts of assets that could support us to get where we need

to be.

• Feature films have a horrendous environmental impact and there is a huge drive in

the industry towards voluntary work towards net zero production. This presents

Norfolk and Suffolk with a great opportunity to be the centre for net zero production.

We need a USP and this could be a net zero teaching studio for games, animation

and virtual production, which could sell the expertise.

Chris Sargisson:

• The aspiration must be for the strategy to take this as far and wide as possible with

businesses to ensure they can work out what role they play in the region’s future

successes and that they can be proud to work here.

• It needs to start with the needs of local communities and then get to the Norfolk and

Suffolk level.

3. In terms of our current business support programmes and interventions e.g.

digital skills, what specifically should we continue with or scale up and what

should we stop doing?

4. How do we enable more businesses to adopt digital technologies to support

their productivity?

John Fagan:

• There are so many companies out there in need of a CTO as this would boost their

productivity no end.

• At Scribe, they build digital tools for town and parish councils trying to improve their

administration and productivity.

• There are so many organisations where they are not using the great software service

tools that are available and could be using it for cost-saving or productivity gains.

Chris Sargisson:

• Businesses do not pick up on these tools because of a lack of time. Majority of

businesses in our region are SMEs who are desperate to learn things but have no

time. Need to find a way to create some time for education.

Catherine Richards:

• Can we be doing more about marginal gains, so if we raise productivity for example

by 1%, the opportunity will be massive for the region?

5. What strategic opportunities are there from stronger collaboration with other

sectors such as agri-food and clean energy to help drive economic growth and

innovation?

6. How can the sector support the transition to net zero from both within the

sector and supporting other sectors? And what support/interventions would

help drive this forward?

Delivered by:

Tim Robinson:

• Part of this is about making choices. Easier to support conversations between this

sector and a couple of other sectors, than it would be with fifteen other sectors. Need

to be focused.

• Always a challenge as there are multiple opportunities for cross-sector collaboration.

• Need to break net zero and cross-sector collaboration down into sub sectors.

• Similarly on the technology side, it is a very broad church too.

Neil Miles:

• Where do we not have the infrastructure? What are the gaps in the infrastructure?

• Prioritisation and focus are needed. A scoring matrix may assist with this e.g.

Sizewell C could be a major opportunity for the sector.

Tim Robinson:

• Really useful exercise would be what have we already got across our digital tech

capabilities and how can these support some of our major opportunities moving

forward.

• If the results of the AI Festival delivered by BT and Stowmarket Innovation Labs were

fantastic, we could consider this for other technologies.

Neil Miles:

• Technology supports and solves use cases.

Julian Munson:

• If there are other thoughts after this call, please do email or get in touch for additional

conversations.

Roundtable Updates:

Eoin Marsh:

• Increased their activity to support companies going international with a focus on Asia-

Pacific, Europe and North America.

Viv Gillespie:

• Suffolk New College’s Tech Campus is being officially launched in early November.

This will hopefully have a strong impact on numbers for those wanting to learn digital

skills.

Chris Sargisson:

• Norfolk Chambers worked closely with Tech East to deliver Talking Tech this month.

• Delighted to see the launch of Productivity East at UEA last week, which will benefit

both the tech and manufacturing sectors.

• Looking forward to relaunching the digital skills sub-group this autumn.

AOB

Next meeting will be scheduled before the end of the year.

Likely to be an item on there about Council membership.

Delivered by: