Business Talk

A new partnership between the University of Portsmouth and Barclays Eagle Labs will provide growth programmes, one-to-one coaching, events, workshops and much more to businesses and entrepreneurs within the city.

The Barclays Eagle

Lab network is one of the largest co-working and incubator networks for start-ups and scale-ups in the UK.

The Labs are spaces to help entrepreneurs and ambitious businesses collaborate, innovate and grow - effectively skills factories for the UK.

The University has been supporting businesses with innovation centres since 2014, offering office, co-working space and University expertise, which has since expanded into four centres within the city under the brand name Innovation Connect.

The new Eagle Lab within Innovation

Connect will provide a more extensive package of support for over 70 businesses already based within Innovation Connect, which come from a range of sectors, from small start-ups to larger, more established businesses.

The collaboration with Eagle Labs will enhance the offering from the University with additional resources and expertise from the Eagle Labs team and members will be supported by an Ecosystems Manager.

The partnership was recently announced during the Portsmouth and South Coast Business Week at a business networking event, Portsmouth Digital, which took place at the University’s Future Technology Centre.

The event offered businesses the chance to learn more about how the University can support them and gave them the opportunity to see some of the digital facilities available.

Innovation Director for the University Chris Worrall said: ‘I’m very excited about what this new partnership will bring to our Innovation Connect members.

‘Having an Eagle Lab based within one of our centres will complement our offering to businesses within our local community and unlock countless opportunities for them to grow and develop.’

Lab Manager at Eagle Labs Mark Rands said:

‘I’m looking forward to expanding the support offered by Eagle Labs to entrepreneurs in Portsmouth.

‘Eagle Labs has a mission to inspire and educate ambitious founders and startups across the UK to help them succeed.’

Keep a lookout for the official launch later in the year and details of how you can get involved.