| Firstly, may I commend each entrant today on their impressive presentations. I do not envy the judges' task of picking a winner, although you could not have had a better panel of judges.
I am delighted to be here today to announce the winners of the new cross Research Council Business Plan competition. This is the first time a competition of this kind has been run across 4 councils, and I think it is very instructive that there are many proposals based on the exploitation of research from more than one council.
I think that business plans such as this one from today's winners are very valuable. Not only do they encourage people to develop their ideas, but they also provide vital mentoring and expert advice to the entrepreneurs who are at the heart of this process. Of course this is a real competition, with real plans and money to pursue interests gives a competition a whole different character.
Last week I gave out prizes for the UK Bioscience Business Plan competition, and before doing so I had a look at the progress made by the finalists in the inaugural Bioscience Business Plan competition in 2000. What was very encouraging is that in all cases the business ideas had been taken forward. In most cases they have made real progress. One had even sold the company before the next competition had come around.
Evidence from the last NERC competition also suggests that most of you will go on to implement your business plans. This is enormously encouraging to Government because we have put a lot into Knowledge Transfer, from universities to industry by introducing schemes such as University Challenge (which provides seed corn funding to universities), Science Enterprise Centres (which provide access to entrepreneurial skills to undergraduates and graduates in science and engineering), and the Higher Education Innovation Fund (which provides funding to universities to encourage them to do knowledge transfer).
Results from the Higher Education Business Interaction Survey show this is making a real impact.
More companies are being spun-out from universities – 199 spin-off firms in 1999/2000, compared to 70 per annum on average in the previous 5 years. And in 1999/2000, UK universities identified one spin off firm for every £8.6 million of research expenditure, Canadian Universities in the same period spun off one firm for every £13.9 million, whilst in the US the ratio was one for every £53.1 million.
It is also encouraging that we are now getting more than our fair share of fast growth high tech businesses in the UK. Recently, Deloitte and Touche published a survey of the 500 fastest growing high tech European companies - 150 are in the UK, compared with 51 in Germany, 97 in France and 43 in Ireland. So there is a real change taking place in this country.
Finally, before I announce the winners, I would like to congratulate all the participants on their enterprise in producing business plans of real quality which compare favourably with the best of those seen by the investment community. I would also like to acknowledge and thank the support of the Sponsors – DTI and Barclays Bank –and the business community for all the advice and help they have offered. And the mentors who have given so generously their time and energy in the course of the competition. This is a real demonstration of partnership between the Research Councils and the business community.
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