Northumbria
University has always been passionate about enterprise, so much so that Northumbria continuously ranks high in the league tables for Graduate
Business start-ups, helped in no small part by the addition of the Innovation Northumbria: Incubator, a dedicated space for
Northumbria's start-up businesses. Opened in December 2019, the Incubator helps to develop Northumbria
students into tomorrow’s entrepreneurs. The purpose-built facility provides
free workspace for students and graduates, helping their businesses to flourish in a professional
environment.
The incubator is managed by
the Student and Graduate Enterprise service, which supports students and recent
graduates from their initial idea to the creation of their business. The
specialised team provide 1 to 1 mentoring support
and business advice, and often bring in individuals
from a team of external experts that cover several key areas from
marketing to website, legal and business growth. Alongside 1 to 1
mentoring they also run specialist workshops and interactive
events. Since setting
up more
than 15 years ago, the service has helped to create and support the
development of hundreds of businesses and
self-employed freelancers and will continue to do so
with the investment in the Incubator space.
The service and Incubator have been instrumental in helping Siddesh Iyer, a masters graduate in International Sport Management, who set up
his business SportFin in
February of this year. Iyer’s business helps community sport
organisations quantify and track the positive social impact they generate. This helps
them leverage this impact to raise funds from funding bodies,
social investors and crowd funders. He feels the service and
incubator has been crucial to the development of his company. ‘The service has been a massive help in terms of
business advice, personal guidance and support and professional
services support such as accounting and legal. They have already
contributed financially through
the mentoring support and office space at the Incubator which has
helped SportFin stay on track through a tough period in our business
life cycle.’
Iyer set
up his business to ensure that community sport could remain sustainable, ’sport was the biggest factor in shaping my life, making me the
person I am, helping me develop a solid social support system, and helping me
develop attitudes and life skills that have helped achieve my biggest
achievements’.
The support Iyer received from
the dedicated Student and Graduate Enterprise team helped give him the
guidance and knowledge he needed, ‘The internship schemes
the Enterprise team signposted me to through funding from Santander
has been crucial in helping me manage my workload and have a good work life
balance. But most of all, their personal guidance and support has kept me above
water – starting up a tech venture is very mentally taxing!’
Like most people, Iyer, who set up his business during the second wave of the
pandemic, has had to face the uncertainty and troubles the Covid-19
pandemic has brought, ‘My business
only started in February this year, and we are still developing our platform
(we are pre-revenue). However, we have felt the impact of COVID-19 in the
funding space. Banks have all but shut their doors for new customers, it was a
struggle to even open a business bank account and took me over 2
months!’ However, with the end of the
pandemic seemingly close, things are looking up for businesses such
as Iyer’s. Iyer found that although the pandemic was hard on the
business it also had its benefits, ‘the pandemic has
increased the need for the SportFin solution for sport clubs
and made them more accepting of technological solutions!’
Student and Graduate
Enterprise supports students and graduates of up to five years post-graduation. Contact the team if you have an idea or already established business you’d like to discuss.
The
project is receiving funding from the England European Regional
Development Fund as part of the European Structural and Investment Funds Growth
Programme 2014-2020. The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government
(and in London the intermediate body Greater London Authority) is the Managing
Authority for European Regional Development Fund. Established by the European
Union, the European Regional Development Fund helps local areas stimulate their
economic development by investing in projects which will support innovation,
businesses, create jobs and local community regeneration. For more information click here.
