Research Reports

Gibson Index Ltd has undertaken a surprising number of reports and surveys into Innovation and Enterprise in the UK, and beyond. On each occasion we gather the right expertise for our teams from the cream of London’s international research community. A few of the reports produced and masterminded by the company are as follows:

1999 – ‘New Zealand: The Future?’

This was initially organised by HR group Korn Ferry, on behalf of the New Zealand Government. Dozens of New Zealand’s most influential individuals and experts gave their personal view on the direction and future policies surrounding innovation and enterprise. These included the head of the Bank of New Zealand, leaders of large business, SMEs and society at large, and from the Maori community. The report provided a unique and independent snapshot of the many ideas and directions about the ways in which a small country - at the far reaches of the global economy – could maximise its economy and influence.

2001 – ‘The University Culture of Enterprise: Knowledge Transfer across the Nation’

This was commissioned by Universities UK, the national association of British and Northern Irish Universities. This was the first attempt to identify the best examples of academic enterprise emerging across the UK in the wake of the first tranche of Third Stream funding by the UK Government. The achievements of well-known Universities such as Oxford, Cambridge, Imperial College and UCL were set out alongside those from newer Universities such as the University of the West of England (Bristol), Bournemouth, Salford and. Dundee.

In addition, the early achievements of pioneering academics such as Prof David Payne of Southampton University – famed for creating the fibre optic amplifier that was the basis of modern Internet communications, of Prof Deborah Withington, of Leeds University, an expert in acoustics who produced a sound alarm that directed people trapped in smoke-filled rooms to the nearest exit.

Research into UK academic enterprise remains a key focus for Gibson Index researchers – and we have logged and noted around 800 business-active University spinout companies – far more than any other research institution, whether Government- or privately-funded.

As a result of this activity, Marcus Gibson increased the number of UK Universities visited to 102 – out of a current total of 120, and also significantly expanded the database of elite contacts.

2003 – ‘Universities and the Creative Industries’

The report was also commissioned by Universities UK. This was the first Report that pinpointed, and crucially also mapped nationwide, the best examples of the many vital links between UK Universities and vibrant, world-class economic sectors in Britain such as music, the arts, design, literature, fashion, digital industries, and many others.

We found that the immensity of the contribution of the Universities to the Creative Industries was little known and little understood. Few are aware, for example, that Queen’s University, Belfast, holds each year the second largest arts festival in the UK, or that the degree show at the London College of Fashion is a ‘must attend’ event for dozens of representatives from the biggest fashion houses around the world.

In publishing & books – one of the SME categories in the Gibson Index – the UK leads the world, for example, as it is one of the few sectors dominated by American firms or the US market. Each year, the University of Northumbria, in north-east England, holds an annual digital arts festival which attracts thousands of specialists.

Some 35,000 design graduates emerge from British Universities each year, and the colleges of design have developed close links with engineering and electronics companies, and many hundreds of small design firms nationwide.

2004 – ‘British Inventors: How to make life easier for them’

This was commissioned by NESTA, the national innovation and promotion agency set up by the Government to help innovators and early stage inventors get their projects off the ground.

The life and career of a British inventor can be long, lonely and frustrating. Too many good ideas have been lost to the economy due to indifference or lack of funding, or the absence of trustworthy contacts, backers and connections. The Report’s team members visited many institutions in the front line of the innovation economy, and offered 35 Recommendations to break down the isolation experienced by inventors. A key element was the proposed expansion of the Virtual Company Scheme, a method of building a commercial entity pioneered by the late David Nicholas MBE, of BusinessLink Wessex.

The Report also produced a list of successful British inventors – most of whom were virtually unknown – who in some cases had designed products that had been sold for a collective value in excess of $200m. One inventor, the gifted chemist Bruce Green, who works in a garden shed in Northamptonshire, first produced an effective and non-toxic treatment against head lice for children that did not contain organophosphates. At first, he could not persuade a number of schoolchildren to trial the new medicine – until he formed a group and named it ‘The Lice Girls’, and its efficacy was quickly proven.

He later went to pioneer special wipes made from a chloride solution – fully effective in hospitals against MRSA and other infections – and his technology was successfully commercialised in the company Tristel plc, which went on the London Stock Market in 2005. His wipes are now used in the majority of UK hospitals and clinics.