focus on west london


business mentors, investors and professional service providers to support the discovery of the next generation of entrepreneurs.


Brunel also has a product start-up incubator: the Central Research Laboratory in Hayes. Formed through a unique partnership between Brunel, regeneration specialists U+I and the Higher Education Funding Council for England, it supports teams at every stage of their entrepreneurial journey – from industrial design to user research, raising investment and manufacturing operations. The incubator’s prototyping workshop, mentoring programme, workspace and in- house expertise are tailored to the needs of hardware entrepreneurs.


Enriching students’ employability


Brunel Business School also runs Business Life, an innovative programme that helps graduates find employment by translating their education into the employability skills local businesses want. The School aims to collaborate with local business to further support the next generation of entrepreneurs and innovators.


Services such as our Professional Development Centre help students to secure placements and internships, either UK-based or international, connecting them with mentors and providing access to meaningful part-time jobs on campus and in the local economy. And students also gain transferrable skills such as teamwork, interpersonal skills and leadership – all of which are central to the university’s development programmes.


All Brunel students are given the opportunity to take up research placements, and we work with industry to establish long-term relationships.


Our students are a vital part of the local community through their volunteering. In 2014/15, a fifth of full-time students at Brunel volunteered for local charities such as Victim Support or the Alzheimer’s Society, amounting to over 21,000 hours of altruistic work. Our Brunel volunteers team works with more than 80 local charities and schools through activities such as mentoring, befriending and stewarding. In addition, our university staff can take 36 hours of paid leave a year to volunteer in local projects, contributing to their respective local communities.


Benefits of a research-intensive university


Engagement with communities enhances the quality and global significance of the teaching and research of research- intensive universities such as Brunel. Research is driven by the need to address


THE BUSINESS MAGAZINE – NOVEMBER 2017


challenges in society – and this impacts on the local as much as it does the global.


One example is the Give & Take Care project, supported by Brunel and funded through winning the Long Term Care Revolution competition held by Innovate UK. The project enables carers to save up a care ‘pension’, which they could then claim back for their own care in their later years. This community-centred solution is already available in Twyford and Slough, with future roll-outs planned for other localities in the Thames Valley and nationwide.


We are committed to sharing our knowledge, resources and skills with the public so that they can understand and appreciate some of the ground-breaking research we conduct. With this in mind, Brunel set up the Public Engagement Fund: an initiative designed to support researchers in undertaking public engagement activity.


We fund projects that touch on topics the public can relate to and get involved in. Recent examples include research into people’s perception of air quality, workshops putting school pupils and their teachers in the shoes of dementia sufferers, and a Young Person’s Advisory Group to assist researchers.


Community hub


More broadly, Brunel acts as a hub for the local community, which is invited onto our lively, active campus all year round. Events such as public lectures and showcase evenings develop and strengthen our relationships with the public, while our annual fireworks night regularly brings in more than 3,500 visitors from across the region.


But the events we put on aren’t the only time we meet members of our local community. Our campus is an open campus, with facilities available and attractive to the public – from our


businessmag.co.uk 17 Engineering project work


sports facilities to our coffee shops and restaurants. And Brunel Arts runs activities from weekly classes to concerts.


Local schoolchildren currently visit our campus as part of outreach activities. Thousands of schoolchildren will be taught each year at our soon-to-be- launched STEM Centre. The Centre aims to increase the number of undergraduates in science, technology, engineering and maths by 20% in the next five years – and global partners such as Fujitsu will be part of the centre, further linking industry to higher education.


Local business and Brunel University London share a mutually underpinned future. We actively encourage businesses across the Thames Valley to visit or contact us to see how we can work together to grow their operations and the local economy.


Contact Brunel University London at: brunel.ac.uk/business/contact


Brunel Innovation Hub


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64  |  Page 65  |  Page 66  |  Page 67  |  Page 68