Innovate Cambridge

Three months in, three events, one clear signal; Cambridge's innovation community brings energy and ambition.   It’s been just over three months since we launched the first Venture Café Cambridge Connect, and what a start to 2026! We collaborated with Venture Café London and Venture Café Global Institute to supercharge Cambridge connections to London and the global network - it’s completely exceeded our already ambitious expectations.   Q1 has seen a vibrant mix of topics and sectors, from creative industries to more traditional innovation spaces, all brought together by curiosity, collaboration, and community. Here's a recap of what's happened and what's to come.   January - The Funding Landscape 💰 We kicked things off with 120+ founders, investors, researchers, and innovators for an evening of workshops, pitching and a standout panel on navigating the 2026 funding landscape. Highlights included: ➤ Creative “Paint Your Personality” workshops with Dr Dilek Ozgit Butler ➤ Innovative pitching games and a panel packed with insights and memorable analogies ➤ Key takeaways for navigating turbulent markets, spotting opportunities in photonics, quantum, and AI, and embracing bold decisions while staying present and adaptable   February - SportsTech 🏅 Venturing into new territory, we explored the SportsTech landscape with support from Elliot J., showcasing how athletes and entrepreneurs are driving innovation at the intersection of HealthTech and Life Sciences. The evening reinforced something we believe deeply: Cambridge is at its best when worlds collide. University, industry, founders, students, and communities with no hierarchy, just curiosity. Brilliant to spotlight InsituGen, Genletics, Shanghai Fulltech Neurotechnology Group (SFNG), Dive Lungfish (Highland Light Ventures) and Faster Future Sports, great companies spanning sectors and connecting Cambridge to the wider ecosystem and beyond.   March - Innovation in Materials 🧪 What can we do with matter itself? This was the question at the heart of March's Venture Cafe Cambridge Connect. The innovator showcases from Sparxell, Notpla, DZP Technologies Ltd and more gave attendees a hands-on look at what's possible, while a rich panel discussion explored funding pathways in the materials innovation space. Attendees gained invaluable insights from John Whittaker, Tim Minshall, Jose Videira and Sophie Vaud leaving the room with both inspiration and practical direction.   Up next - Play, Design, Disrupt: AI & Immersive Tech in Gaming 🎮 April's Venture Café Cambridge Connect will explore how artificial intelligence and immersive technologies are reshaping gaming and the creative industries.   📌 Register here: https://lnkd.in/erNP4Ntd 💡 Want to get more involved? Explore the Ambassadorship Programme: https://bit.ly/45VWY7A

Inside Cambridge’s world-class innovation ecosystem - demonstrating why the city is one of the world's most important innovation locations. 🧫 Cambridge biotech company Immutrin has closed an oversubscribed £65m Series A led by Frazier Life Sciences with participation from F-Prime, Qiming Venture Partners, SR One Capital Management and founding investors Cambridge Innovation Capital and Cambridge Enterprise Ventures. Mihriban Tuna, an Entrepreneur in Resident at Cambridge Innovation Capital, is leading the team developing a next-gen antibody approach to reverse amyloidosis - rare diseases caused by misfolded proteins that lead to irreversible organ damage 🔗 https://lnkd.in/eZdtzvmv   📊 Cambridge Industrial Innovation Policy published the UK Innovation Report 2026 this week, analysing how well innovation is translating into productivity, growth, and competitiveness. Key findings: ➤ Research and innovation don’t automatically lead to industrial competitiveness ➤ UK tech scaleup is concentrated in a narrow set of sectors;  ➤ Skills are not fully aligned with jobs constraining innovation, productivity and growth 🔗https://lnkd.in/exsBRpCv Together, across Cambridge, we are working on these topics and many more - come visit us to find out more   🎤 One of the most thought-provoking events of the year - Bennett School of Public Policy Annual Conference - bringing together leading thinkers, practitioners and policymakers to explore some of the most pressing issues shaping public policy today. 🚀 Innovate UK has announced a new approach through its strategy published this week, committing to a more focused, hands-on approach to backing deep tech companies across six priority sectors: advanced manufacturing, clean energy, creative industries, defence, life sciences, and digital technologies. Cambridge is well positioned across all these sectors and we look forward to working with these companies and UKRI to deliver impact. 🔗https://lnkd.in/edDxRUNQ   At The Glasshouse: 🔹 Cambridge Global Health Partnerships brought together an insightful panel exploring why global health is local health, and why healthcare systems everywhere have something to learn from each other. 🔹 The Creating Cambridge workshop, hosted in collaboration with CamBAST, used Lego Serious Play to build a shared vision for a greater Cambridge. 🔹 EWOR x Oxford-Cambridge Fellowship hosted a session with Jamie Potter and Daniel W. Dippold on models for entrepreneurship, practical frameworks for decision-making, productivity, and long-term thinking over short-term outcomes. 🔹 Open Coffee Cambridge, in collaboration with CAMentrepreneurs, welcomed Michelle Tempest for a conversation spanning innovation, strategy, global connection and the startup ecosystem, with a special thank you to Biscotti di Debora for the treats. Coming up: 📅 Venture Café Cambridge Connect: Play, Design, Disrupt - AI & Immersive Tech in Gaming | Tuesday 14 April | 17:00–20:00 Venture Café London

The Cambridge x Manchester Partnership stepped up a gear this week with a Partnership Dinner and three Discovery Roundtables, marking a significant shift to delivery.   More on the Partnership Dinner at Fitzwilliam College below - a brilliant evening bringing together senior leaders from our universities, corporates, and investors to move the conversation onto practical next steps.   The first three Discovery Roundtables focused on Climate Tech, Life Sciences, and Materials, drawing from sectors in the Industrial Strategy. The sessions brought together investors, academics, and businesses from across Cambridge and Manchester to explore the strengths each city brings, where the gaps are, and the tangible opportunities the Partnership can deliver. These roundtables are directly shaping the Partnership, so thank you to everyone who joined across all three sessions. The remaining Discovery Roundtables, covering Quantum, Defence, and the Creative Industries, will follow soon.   And it was brilliant to have The Cambridge x Manchester Partnership team together for the first time 🙌 Faye Holland Gemma Cranston Alexander Roy Becky Gardner Abigail Housley

Great to see our Executive Director, Kathryn Chapman highlighting the potential of the Oxford-Cambridge Growth Corridor to boost good growth across the UK. The government backed, Oxford-Cambridge Corridor will provide the scale needed for the UK to compete globally and has the potential to add up to £78bn to the UK economy. The Chancellors recent announcement to double the funding available - up to £800m - will help unlock new homes, labs and transport, as part of plans to deliver good jobs, housing and connectivity. Cambridge is building companies with global impact catalysing investment and employment across the region. University of Cambridge, Cambridge Enterprise, Cambridge Innovation Capital, Anglia Ruskin University, Oxford-Cambridge Supercluster Board, Cambridge City Council, Cambridgeshire & Peterborough Combined Authority

What a Tuesday afternoon! 🙌 Today we brought together 30 brilliant minds from across the Cambridge innovation ecosystem for Creating Cambridge: a workshop to envision what a truly regenerative, world-leading ecosystem could look like. It was everything we hoped for and more. Using Lego Serious Play® methodology, our guests rolled up their sleeves, picked up the bricks, and built their visions of a Cambridge that creates more startups, solves bigger problems, and makes the world genuinely better. The energy, the ideas, the conversations…something quite special. A huge thank you to our incredible speakers who sparked the room: 👉 Shirley Jamieson 👉 Peter Tyler 👉Sam Goodall 👉 Olu Orugboh 👉 Harriet Kelsall 👉 Charlotte Horobin Thank you also to Faye Holland for keeping the whole afternoon flowing as our MC, keeping everything running smoothly behind the scenes. To Shima Barakat for facilitating such a thought-provoking Serious Play® session, you made the magic happen. And to Temujen Gunawardena for bringing our ideas to life in real time as our live illustrator, seeing the room's thinking take shape on paper was a treat. 🎨 This is just the beginning. The ideas built today are the seeds of something bigger, and we can't wait to see what grows from them. 🌱 Watch this space for the outputs and next steps. And if today's themes resonate with you, we'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments: what does a regenerative innovation ecosystem mean to you? Thank you to everyone who came and gave the afternoon their all. You made it. CamBAST | Innovate Cambridge #CambridgeInnovation #CreatingCambridge #LegoSeriousPlay #StartupEcosystem #Innovation #Cambridge

Welcome to Cambridge Tech Week Kickstarter, the event that's putting Cambridge firmly on the global innovation map. This year's theme? How Deep Tech Changes the World. If you're a founder, investor, or tech enthusiast, tune in to find out more about the week, and to hear the panel discussion at the kickstarter event. The episode starts with updates from Kathryn Chapman (Innovate Cambridge), Rob Bridge (Cambridgeshire & Peterborough Combined Authority), Dr Mike Short CBE FREng FIET FBCS FITP and Michaela Eschbach (Cambridge Wireless). We then cover the highlights of the panel discussion that asks “What Does a World-Class Deep Tech Ecosystem Actually Look Like?” Kathryn Chapman hosts, and highlights included: Professor Sir John Aston (University of Cambridge) emphasised the university's core mission: "Impact society through education, teaching and research at the highest levels of international excellence." He highlighted how Cambridge is already embedding AI across operations, teaching, and research - and why researchers must adopt these tools to compete globally. Jo Słota-Newson (Almanac Ventures) talked about how Cambridge's distinctiveness lies in its interconnected nature. Researchers, academics, corporates, and creatives all in one melting pot. But here's the often-overlooked ingredient: nurturing creativity alongside technical excellence. Lucy Yu (CEO, Centre for Net Zero (Octopus Energy Group) brought energy sector perspective, highlighting the government's newly established AI Energy Council, a strategic move bringing energy and AI policy teams to the same table. Her insight: "These two policies could quite easily have worked in tension with each other... by having them at the table very early on, the conversations are much more constructive." Plus so much more. Cambridge isn't just another tech hub. It's a deliberate ecosystem where world-class research, creative thinking, and bold partnerships converge. The government is backing it. The talent is there. Will you be there to hear more during Cambridge Tech Week this September? In this week’s #CamTechPod news and updates: Department for Business and Trade, UK-Ukraine TechBridge, Oxford Edge, University of Oxford, Cambridgeshire Chamber of Commerce, Anglia Ruskin University, Arm, Luminance, Greg Pelander, Helen Ledger, Pragmatic Semiconductor Headline sponsor Holden Polestar

Britain's next industrial revolution is being powered from Cambridge. 🔹 Vice-Chancellor Debbie Prentice shared thoughts on why historic university ties and new technology go hand in hand - University of Cambridge https://bit.ly/47dFgxe 🔹 Innovation | Partnership | Impact - Cambridge Enterprise published their Annual Review 2025 🔗 https://bit.ly/4c0dBSb 🔹 Anglia Ruskin University and Arm opened the ARU Arm AI Lab 🔗 https://bit.ly/4sZvVBD   The technologies being developed here, from drug discovery and materials science to climate tech and cyber-security are central to the UK's position in a global race for deep tech leadership. The Chancellor, Rachel Reeves set out this week why that matters: the risk of UK tech capability drifting abroad is real, and the response must be deliberate investment into the infrastructure and ecosystems capable of competing at scale. ⚛️ UK’s “Quantum leap” - up to £2bn support to establish the UK as a world leader in Quantum, from skills and talent to research and procurement programmes. As a global centre for quantum research, Cambridge is not just participating in this revolution, it is a primary location for it. The IonQ Quantum Innovation Centre will support development of new applications in healthcare, climate tech, and materials science. 🔗 https://bit.ly/4lGr7hS   📖 Research to application at scale - global competitiveness in deep tech depends on the full pipeline functioning, from fundamental research through to company formation and growth. Talent, investment and enabling infrastructure are critical. £800m Oxford-Cambridge Growth Corridor investment to unlock homes, labs and infrastructure, and the £45m Sunrise AI supercomputer dedicated to fusion power were announced this week - encouraging to see momentum continuing. 🔗 https://bit.ly/47eBJyM 🔹Also this week, a new kind of engineering arrived in the UK - the National Centre for Propulsion and Power (NCPP) Cambridge West took delivery of a 60-tonne pressure vessel, strengthening the UK's capability in aerospace, energy, and defence. 🔗https://bit.ly/41hyOBP At The Glasshouse 🔹The Innovate Cambridge board met this week for a strategy session on accelerating progress toward our collective targets for inclusive innovation and good growth in the region, and events included the Cambridge Tech Week Launch, the Cambridge Festival event on AI and Digital Policy, and a practical IP strategy workshop for founders hosted by Founders Growth Community.   Coming up: 📅 Raising the Bar for Global Health | Wednesday 26 March | 18:00–20:00 Cambridge Global Health Partnerships - Exploring how the world's biggest healthcare challenges connect to our own communities. 🔗 https://lnkd.in/eHMX-Sqn Save the date – Venture Café Connect: Play, Design, Disrupt: AI & Immersive Tech in Gaming | Tuesday 14 April | 17:00-20:00

This Week at The Glasshouse The Cambridge Festival connects communities with the University’s research and creativity - a vibrant and unique celebration of research, opening the doors of the University to everyone. We were proud to welcome Cambridge Festival to The Glasshouse to explore AI and Digital Policy with a room brimming with curiosity and thoughtful debate. Hosted by the Bennett Institute for Public Policy - now Bennett School of Public Policy, the conversation brought together Diane Coyle, Jeni Tennison, Kathryn Chapman, and Aleksei Turobov, PhD for a rich discussion on where policy, technology, and society intersect. 🏛️ Cambridge's ecosystem is uniquely positioned to contribute directly to national policy conversations - through bodies such as the Bennett School of Public policy, CSaP - Centre for Science and Policy, University of Cambridge and ai@cam, we have the depth of expertise and the relationships to make that contribution count. 🎯The framing of AI adoption matters. When we move away from inevitability and towards choice, we create the conditions for more thoughtful, willing, and effective engagement with the technology. 🌱Cambridge has a genuine opportunity to lead by example, using AI as an enabler of good, inclusive growth. Launch of Cambridge Tech Week A pleasure to host Cambridge Wireless at the launch of Cambridge Tech week - an incredible panel with exceptional expertise providing perspectives into the current deep tech landscape across Cambridge and the UK and why it matters for economic growth and prosperity - John Aston, Lucy Yu, Jo Słota-Newson A sneak peak of what’s in store at Cambridge Tech Week running 14–18 September 2026. Register and keep up to date here 👉 https://lnkd.in/eSzwVt7G  Michaela Eschbach, Dr Mike Short CBE FREng FIET FBCS FITP   Across the Ecosystem 🔬 The Institute for Manufacturing (IfM), University of Cambridge is hosting two upcoming events building on the themes explored at last week's Venture Café Cambridge Connect, which took a close look at Innovation in Materials. Find out more 👉 https://lnkd.in/ea-PvDKQ Upcoming Events at The Glasshouse 📅 In-Person Office Hours with Amazon Web Services (AWS) Startups | Wednesday 25th March | 10:00 – 16:00 Designed for founders of early-stage through to Series B tech startups. Please note these sessions focus on AI, data, and cloud needs. Investors, accelerators, and ecosystem organisations are welcome to reach out to the AWS Startups team directly to explore collaboration. Spaces are limited, book your slot here 👉https://lnkd.in/e_iUKbgf   📅Open Coffee Cambridge Friday 27th March | 08:30 – 10:00 Open Coffee Cambridge welcomes special guest Michelle Tempest - doctor, investor, and healthcare strategist. Guests will also have the chance to sample the creations of Biscotti di Debora and hear Debora's story as a business owner in Cambridgeshire. Sign up here 👉 https://luma.com/d8dm3hg7