Five of the West Midlands largest business and professional services organisations have committed to meeting innovative technology firms from across the region.
Senior representatives from BNP Paribas Personal Finance, Wesleyan, Bruntwood SciTech, Shoosmiths and Barclays have committed to one-on-one meetings with emerging technology companies.
Organised by SuperTech, the meetings are designed to help growing firms access the business, professional and financial services sector, which generates £27.8 billion gross value added annually and employs more than 360,000 people in the West Midlands.
Andrea Tittel – director of innovation, customer & propositions at BNP Paribas Personal Finance, Anthony Pryke – Barclays’ Eagle Labs ecosystem manager, David Stewart – Wesleyan group chief operating officer, Cliff Dennett – head of business development at Bruntwood SciTech and Shoosmiths partner Tony Randle – will meet with 30 businesses over the next six months.
Hilary Smyth-Allen, SuperTech executive lead, said: “Relationships between established businesses and innovative companies are critical to economic development. However, gaining that access as a new entrant can be virtually impossible.
“As the UK’s first dedicated ProfTech supercluster, we believe the key to unlocking the true potential of the West Midlands’ professional and financial services cluster is by nurturing and accelerating an ecosystem that is based on collaboration between all firms, no matter their size.
“Our new Connector Series has been launched to facilitate this collaboration by providing unique access to major firms from across the West Midlands for SMEs, startups and founders across the FinTech, InsurTech, LegalTech, PropTech and HRtech sectors. The series will help to accelerate engagement and exploration of mutual interests.”
Stephen Hunt, CEO of BNP Paribas Personal Finance, commented: “I am a big supporter of what SuperTech is trying to achieve. I think that connecting the growing tech community with an established businesses like ours is a great initiative. Like many businesses in our sector we are focussed on finding better ways to manage our business and support our customers and I look forward to seeing if there are organisations in the West Midlands that can help with this task.”
To be in with the chance of securing one of the places businesses are being encouraged to register their interest at: www.supertechwm.com/connector-series