Discovery Park: where collaboration and community come first
“At Discovery Park we don’t view ourselves as property developers or managers, we work in partnership with the companies located here, we invest in them emotionally as well as fiscally.”
Jane Kennedy is Chief Business Officer at Discovery Park, Kent, the thriving life sciences and technology science park based near Sandwich.
It’s one of the UK’s most important science parks and home not only to Pfizer (one of the world’s most successful pharmaceutical companies which has a substantial facility on site employing around 1,000 people), but also more than 160 start-up, scale-up and established businesses from bio-techs to healthcare, technology, professional services and more.
The science park covers more than 220 acres and is also home to a Barclays Eagle Lab, one of the UK’s largest co-working and incubator networks for young companies. Among its many business support programmes, Eagle Labs runs a funding readiness programme, preparing companies to pitch to investors. To help combat the increasingly challenging funding landscape, Discovery Park has its own fund, Discovery Park Ventures, which has already invested in several innovative young life science businesses.
Discovery Park’s science facilities are high quality thanks to early investment in pharmaceutical-grade laboratory space by Pfizer, but equally as important in Jane’s opinion, is the growing community and collaborations between companies.
Discovery Park is an easy choice
Jane said: “Good quality lab space is very important, but young companies also demand a thriving community and dynamic network.
“We offer both, and our space has the added advantage of being more cost effective than that of the same quality in London, or the more established science and technology clusters around Oxford and Cambridge. For young companies making early-stage investment or grant-funding go further, Discovery Park is an easy choice. It’s a gateway to Europe and just 70 minutes away from London St Pancras thanks to new high-speed train links.”
Thanks to the early success of Discovery Park’s incubation space, which opened at the beginning of the year, the park has appointed a Head of Innovation. Renos Savva, the entrepreneur and founder of a successful drug discovery firm who has mentored many successful CEOs and companies, is now running Discovery Park’s Spark programme. This is an eight-week programme and competition designed to prepare companies for growth and investment. The winner can secure a prize fund worth in excess of £100,000.
Discovery Park is also building its own network of companies and organisations across the region. “We recently invited primary care clinicians from NHS Kent and Medway on site to discuss issues around unmet clinical need so that companies based here better understand the solutions they’re looking for,” explained Jane.
The Park is also looking at creating shared lab facilities on site in conjunction with Canterbury Christchurch University – and offering short term lab use.
“Running a successful science and technology park needs a lot more imagination than simply running a business park,” said Jane.
“Our community demands a unique environment where they are supported with office and lab space, and offered new opportunities and the chance to meet people they would be less likely to meet elsewhere, as well as each other through the many social events we organise and host.”
Discovery Park Kent is a growing life sciences community rooted in the region thanks, in no small part, to its long-standing scientific base originally built around Pfizer.
“The beauty of Discovery Park Kent is the growing diversity and community of companies here which are rooted in scientific excellence,” added Jane.
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