Representatives from the 15 hubs in Lancaster University’s Wave 2 Growth Hub Programme and a further five existing growth hubs in the UK, including Manchester Business Growth Hub and Lancashire BOOST, took part in an interactive day to exchange ideas and knowledge on how best to support UK businesses to grow.

Dr Amy Gibbons, W2GH Programme Manager, said: “The energy in the room was a testimony to the desire of local growth hubs to work together, as a network, to improve business support. It was exciting to hear them sharing their experiences and successes. The real power of this network is in its ability to build on both regional similarities and differences to create and develop excellent business support for UK business and industry.” 

Lancaster University’s Knowledge Exchange and Research (KE&R) group organised the day to share and promote good practice across the increasing number of hubs in the country.

At the event the hubs shared several success stories: one growth hub had already engaged with 300 businesses in three months; another expected to meet 80% of their jobs creation target by July; another had enrolled over 70% of key partners since their launch; and another was attracting over 750 businesses to an upcoming summit. Considering growth hubs have only been in existence for about six months, this is impressive progress.

The group also heard about the power of the network to bring people together. Existing hubs have not only been supporting large and small businesses to use the hub to share best practice with one another, but have even been using their experiences to support growth hubs to develop in other regions, sometimes geographically very different to their own. Supported by Lancaster University, this network of hubs is emerging as an exciting and effective contribution to business growth in the UK.

For further information on the RGF Wave 2 Growth Hub Programme, please visit our website or contact Dr Amy Gibbons, W2GH Programme Manager, a.gibbons1@lancaster.ac.uk.