Welsh Life Sciences Hub Calls for Industry Collaboration to Fight COVID-19

Wales’ leading organization for healthcare innovation is calling on companies and innovators from across the United Kingdom to join the fight against coronavirus.

Life Sciences Hub Wales is launching “a nationwide drive to get companies from a range of sectors working together on solutions.” It aims to accelerate the development of “urgently needed products and treatments, such as ventilators, hand sanitisers and Personal Protective Equipment to ease the pressures on health care services and help protect frontline staff combating the outbreak.” 

The organization, which facilitates collaborations and innovations between NHS Wales, industry,  and academia, has identified four key challenge areas “that must be urgently addressed to support healthcare services during the outbreak: medical devices, infection control, digital solutions, and social isolation.” It is working with businesses from a range of industries, including manufacturing, food and drink, IT, and healthcare, to explore how to scale up production, repurpose existing products, and deploy their expertise and capabilities to deal with the crisis.

Last week, Life Sciences Hub Wales hosted a major industry-wide virtual conference which saw over 200 participants across 150 organizations come together to discuss possible ways of working together to tackle COVID-19 in line with the four challenges. Industry names from across the globe joined the call, including GE Healthcare, Amazon Web Services, and Siemens Healthineers. A number of key projects have been identified with more information on these set to become available in the coming days. 

Life Sciences Hub Wales is now looking for companies and experts who could support efforts within any of the four challenge areas to get in touch via email.

Any companies interested in getting involved should email their offer of support and details of their availability and capability to information@lshubwales.com