The Sector
Liverpool City Region is one of the UK’s fastest growing hubs for digital companies and has long been recognised globally for creativity in sciences and the arts. The City Region has an exceptional array of Digital & Creative assets which are not only nationally, but internationally significant.
It’s a range of key assets including many of our school’s industry partners/collaborators:
• FACT – one of the UK’s leading media arts centres
• notable strengths of the creative industries – particularly in games development, film and video, TV, music, and design, with a particular concentration in the Baltic Triangle
• an active e-health cluster and the largest scale deployment of health technology for a single economy in Europe (EU Commission)
• the AIMES N3 data storage facility at Wavertree Technology Campus
“Sensor City” – one of the first sensor technology incubators in the world – plus the “Materials Innovation Factory” – the intended global leader in computer-aided materials science & discovery – both under construction and opening in 2017.
Key initiatives in development include a digital accelerator vehicle linked to the Hartree Centre, potential Institute of Technology, Virtual LCR “in silico” simulation tool, and the provision of more workspace at both SciTech Daresbury and the Baltic Triangle.
As a City Region, our key digital and creative skills challenges are:
• Creating skills offer that is both credible and responsive to the specific needs of the market
• Meeting a ‘fusion’ challenge welding together technical computing and creative skills to create new digital products and services (Creative Skillset 2)
• Working with many Digital and Creative employers’ preference for competence over qualifications – creating a challenge for skills planning
• Best utilisation of the wide availability of learning materials, self-start guides and open markets in the development of digital products
The Liverpool City Region’s creative and digital SME base represents both a major asset in its own right and a pivotal platform for future growth.