Scaling OxCam: creating the conditions for better growth

A new report from Public First and the Oxford-Cambridge Supercluster Board explores what it will take to scale the Oxford-Cambridge Growth Corridor into one of the world’s leading innovation clusters, and the conditions needed to enable more companies to start, grow and stay here.

"Scaling the OxCam Corridor" looks at lessons from successful innovation clusters around the world and identifies access to capital, commercialisation, talent, infrastructure and connectivity among the key factors determining whether the region can fulfil its potential.

The report reinforces something we strongly believe at Equinox: world-leading research and innovation are only part of the equation.

For Oxfordshire, successful growth also means creating the conditions in which businesses can scale with confidence, people can develop the skills they need to participate in the innovation economy, and the benefits of growth create greater opportunity for the communities that live and work here.

Importantly, the report highlights the need to develop and retain talent across the "whole workforce", from researchers, entrepreneurs and founders to technicians and the wider workforce that enables a successful innovation economy to function.

It also points to international examples where long-term investment in skills and employer-led vocational pathways has helped successful clusters grow, alongside the importance of housing, transport and other infrastructure in attracting and retaining people.

For Equinox, these ambitions go hand in hand.

Olga Kozlova, Chair of Equinox Operational Board, said: “Oxfordshire has extraordinary strengths in research and innovation. Our opportunity now is to translate those strengths into better growth, enabling businesses to scale here while connecting that success with skills, jobs and opportunities for more people across Oxfordshire.”

As the Oxford-Cambridge Growth Corridor gathers momentum, ensuring Oxfordshire can both contribute to and benefit from that growth will require collaboration across business, universities, government and our communities.

That is at the heart of Equinox: bringing partners together to help ensure Oxfordshire’s extraordinary innovation economy delivers economic success alongside opportunity for more of the people and places around it.

 Read the full Public First report: "Scaling the OxCam Corridor.”