NEPIC signs international agreement with Axelera

On November 27 president of Axelera Bruno Allenet and Dr Stan Higgins, CEO of NEPIC, attended an event in France to celebrate their commitment to working together.

UK Trade and Investment put the UK and French-based chemicals cluster organisations in touch over two years ago.

This type of collaboration will help our organisations to share best practice.

Dr Stan Higgins

CEO

NEPIC

It has been supporting them in working together ever since and has now helped to facilitate an official collaboration agreement for future projects.

Shared specialisms

NEPIC is made up of 380 pharmaceutical, biotechnology and chemicals companies based in north east England.

Companies in Axelera share a number of specialist interests with firms in NEPIC in the fields of process intensification, bio refineries and environmental improvements.

Dr Higgins said: “This type of collaboration will help our organisations to share best practice, forge business relationships for our members and build innovation projects between our companies and academics that will enable us to seek further European and national support for our regions.”

Key aspirations for the partnership include developing a knowledge-sharing process for addressing challenges faced by the global chemicals industry, particularly environmental issues.

Progressive partnership

This type of cluster-to-cluster collaboration is considered by business strategy guru Michael Porter of Harvard Business School to be important to the future of companies working in the chemicals sector.

There is a move towards cluster linkages as part of global value chains, creating an environment in which clusters are competing and co-operating at the same time he believes.

Axelera and NEPIC are therefore examples of highly innovative, forward-thinking business development organisations.

Andrew Cahn, chief executive, of UK Trade & Investment, said: “I am delighted that NEPIC and Axelera have formed this partnership.

“I am sure that this network will be exciting, dynamic and generate business for all companies linked to the cluster.”