INSIGHTS / News

The SETsquared Partnership, one of the UK’s most successful university collaborations, today announced the appointment of Graham Harrison as its new Partnership Director.

Graham’s most recent role was as International Business Director at the South West of England Regional Development Agency, where he worked with academia, industry and government to develop and lead partnerships, and to creative innovative support for SMEs. He has worked in senior roles in both the public and private sectors over nearly three decades.

Keith Robson, chair of the SETsquared management group, said: “Graham brings with him a wealth of experience, and has the proven ability to work with investors and business to deliver innovative, large scale industrial collaboration projects. He will make a substantial impact to help SETsquared generate value from its research base, and to enable the partnership to help drive economic growth.”

Graham Harrison, Partnership Director of SETsquared, said: “I’m delighted to be joining SETsquared at a time when the universities’ role in generating economic growth through collaboration with industry and support of early-stage businesses is more important than ever, and I look forward to the challenges ahead.”

One of Graham’s first activities will be to act as host of SETsquared’s annual Investment Showcase, which takes place in London on October 12th. The event brings together investors and nineteen early-stage companies, with innovations on show in healthcare, green technology, software and a broad range of engineering disciples. These companies are the life blood of our economy going forward and through events such as this SETsquared endeavours to fast track their growth and development.

As International Business Director at the South West of England Regional Development Agency, Graham’s responsibilities included attracting foreign direct investment, engaging with strategic businesses and supporting the development of priority sectors including aerospace, bio-medical and micro-electronics. Two recent initiatives included the building of a consortium of university and multi-national businesses to successfully bid for £25m of government and EU funds to establish the National Composites Centre in Bristol, and the formation of innovation networks (iNETs) to offer support to SMEs in five high-growth sectors.

The SETsquared Partnership is the enterprise collaboration between five universities: Bath, Bristol, Exeter, Southampton and Surrey. The Partnership works with academia, industry, students and start-ups to generate economic growth and has the UK’s largest network of incubators for early-stage hi-tech, high growth potential companies.

Graham Harrison can be contacted by email: [email protected]