Welcome to my weekly South West Tech News roundup, where you can get all the headlines from the past week in one place.
What has our busy tech and digital community been up to this week? From award wins and innovative breakthroughs to unmissable events and capital raised, take a moment to reflect on the hive of daily activity taking place in our region.
If you have a story to share, wizz it over to shona@techspark.co – I look forward to hearing from you!
MyWorld welcomes the next cohort of creative techies
Seven cutting-edge projects have been granted a share of £1.2m and a place on the pioneering MyWorld programme, led by the University of Bristol, and selected by Digital Catapult, the UK authority on advanced digital technology.
From immersive events to video game production and exploring AI applications, learn more about the creative organisations joining MyWorld here.
Creative Bath announces its finalists for the 2024 awards
You can have a peek at the shortlist here. Taking place on 22 May at the highly-popular hub of creativity, Komedia, you can also get yourself a ticket here.
£1 million funding for Bristol startup engineering the future of home heating
It’s a major boost for Nusku – a company formed in 2022 after a casual chat over coffee about why heat pumps aren’t more popular led to its founder Russell Murchie taking a leap of faith and leaving his job at Dyson to tackle the problem head-on.
Two years later and Nusku has six employees, a workshop and office space at Future Space – the University of the West of England’s innovation centre – and now a huge funding injection thanks to a £727,000 grant from the Department for Energy Security & Net Zero (DESNZ). This follows £245,000 of pre-seed funding from key people within the energy sector.
University of Gloucestershire kicks off new Cyber Launchpad Scheme with local businesses
The Gloucestershire Cyber Launchpad (GCL) will bring together innovative and forward-thinking employers who are committed to making new apprenticeship roles in cyber security available within their organisations, to be filled by new recruits with untapped talent and the potential to thrive.
A recruitment event on 30 May 2024 at the University’s Oxstalls Campus will provide opportunities for potential candidates to meet with employers and gain more information about the new apprenticeship roles.
EE opens new Bristol Experience store in Cabot Circus with ex-England rugby player Ugo Monye
Yesterday EE unveiled its first Experience store in the South West. The store is designed to introduce shoppers to the latest in connected technology, providing them with face-to-face advice and guidance on a range of different connectivity and technology solutions for their everyday life.
It comes as new research** from EE reveals that only 5% of Bristolians would usually get help from retail staff when they need support with their connected technology, despite more than half (52%) admitting that speaking to a specialist in store would give them more confidence in choosing the right technology products.
Amdaris wins 2023 Stripe Partner of the Year
Bristol-based insights company, Amdaris, has been awarded for exceptional engagement with Stripe in the past 12 months and celebrates the new potential that their developers have unlocked for Stripe’s business partners.
Nick Stephen, Amdaris’ Head of Enterprise Partnerships, comments, “Amdaris is built for quality and scale, delivering outstanding, customised and secure software development services to our international customers. We’re proud of this recognition and our continued work with Stripe, and look forward to our engagement growing further in 2024.”
Nina Adams steps up to Studio Director at Auroch Digital
Auroch Digital is delighted to announce Nina Adams has stepped into the role of Studio Director at the Bristol-based studio. Nina takes over the 130 strong studio from co-founder, Dr Tomas Rawlings, who has moved into a new role of Vice President at Sumo Digital UK supporting Auroch Digital, The Chinese Room & Midoki.
“It’s incredibly exciting to be heading up the wonderful development team at Auroch, and to be its first woman Studio Director,” says Nina. “We’ve got 130 brilliant game developers working on some fantastic projects and I’m looking forward to help bring those games to launch alongside seeking out new opportunities for the studio.”
Auroch Digital works on original game titles, partnerships, and co-development, specialising in strategy, retro, porting and digital tabletop games. The studio is currently working on several titles including amazing ports, co-development projects and original IPs (such as Mars Horizon 2: The Search for Life).
Deazy appoints new CTO with to support enterprise expansion
Bristol-based technology startup Deazy has Marko Ivanovski as its new Chief Technology Officer, tasked with supporting the company’s ongoing targeting of the enterprise market. Marko says, “Enterprises are struggling to find the tech talent with the capacity and capability to help them achieve their goals, and using Deazy is a highly effective way of doing so. It’s a great time to join the company, and I’m excited about what can be achieved.”
