Six SMEs selected to collaborate with NHS Scotland

Six Scottish small and medium-sized businesses have won seven new contracts with NHS Scotland to help drive treatment and innovation in dermatology, diabetes and inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).

The firms will work with NHS Scotland on treatments for conditions including diabetes. Picture: Getty Images/iStockphoto

Scottish Enterprise said that Scottish firms had secured more than 50 per cent of the R&D funding awarded to UK companies – a total of £345,000 – as part of the recent NHS Scotland open innovation competitions.

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The companies that have secured funding are AxSys Technology in Glasgow (diabetes); Cohesion Medical Ltd in Glasgow (dermatology and IBD); Digital Treetop in Perth (IBD); Epipole in Rosyth (dermatology); OpenBrolly Health in Elgin (IBD); Storm ID in Edinburgh (dermatology).

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Jim Watson, director of innovation and enterprise services at Scottish Enterprise, said: “It’s fantastic to see Scottish companies securing more than half of the NHS Scotland R&D funding, but we’re keen to get even more Scottish SMEs involved in other open innovation competitions.

“We currently have ten live competitions from City of Edinburgh Council, Carbon Trust and Stena Line on our website, all looking for innovative ideas to solve challenges.”

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SMEs who get such funding retain full intellectual funding of their products, meaning they are free to offer it to other customers and other markets.

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