Great response to GROW

An exciting diversity of business ideas have registered for the GROW business plan competition and the entrepreneurs have now been paired up with their mentors for this next phase – preparing a compelling business plan – which needs to be submitted on the 29th April 2016.

We are delighted that GROW has been given the backing of Innovate UK  which provides funding for agri-tech collaborative research projects and is a keen advocate for entrepreneurial endeavour.

Calum Murray, Programme Leader for Sustainable Agriculture and Food Innovation Platform at Innovate UK, and part of the Agri-TechE Stakeholder Group says:

“Innovate UK is committed to supporting Agri-TechE and the cluster, and we are very happy to be supporting GROW. We will be providing strong ongoing support for the competition, and will be helping to facilitate the final on 22 June at Throws Farm Technology Centre.”

GROW aims to support the growth of  an entrepreneurial agri-tech cluster and this requires the involvement of many different parties, several of whom have written about their thoughts.

• Helen Francis of the Department of Engineering, University of Cambridge, describes how ‘Engineers are rising to the GROW challenge’
• Richard Anscombe of FramFarmers says it is all about having a go.
• Peter van Esse of the 2Blades Group at The Sainsbury Laboratory says the ‘Translation of research vital for agri-tech innovation‘
• Dr David Llewellyn, Vice-Chancellor of Harper Adams University, sees increasing interest from students for subjects such as robotics, software engineering and the use of drones in agronomy as a means to capture the enthusiasm of young people for agri-food careers

The winners for GROW will receive a cash prize to spend on business support and finalists will each receive a support prizes, which have been kindly provided by:

Barr Ellison LLP, Cambridge Cleantech, Cambridge Judge Business School, Cambridge Network, Centre for Entrepreneurial Learning, Future Business Centre Cambridge, ideaSpace, Norfolk Network, and Norwich Research Park.

To read more about GROW click here.