Ignite Labs: Health & Care Innovations

Available to startups and SMEs looking to innovate towards a profitable and sustainable business model, this programme aims to help businesses overcome barriers, understand and improve decision making, maximise design capabilities, and expand market engagement.

The Ignite Labs programme is designed for businesses located in the UK that are developing innovative products and services (eg technologies, medical devices, digital solutions) in any field relating to human health and wellbeing.  Fields of interest include but are not limited to:

• Healthy Living/Ageing
• Consumer Health
• Exercise & Fitness
• Personal Care
• Diagnostics

The programme is led and supported by design and industry experts and provides the opportunity to:

• Unlock access to a range of exciting design thinking tools, methods and processes that will support you in developing a robust plan for effective innovation activity
• Identify opportunities for an innovative intervention through a range of site visit tours, design thinking workshops and industry presentations
• Have a professional design in innovation agency take you through an exciting process of customer needs discovery, idea generation and idea testing
• Leverage a human centred approach to innovation to gain a deeper understanding of business challenges and spot opportunities to derive more value from ideas.
• Network with a community of UK SME’s and primary innovators in Health & Care, Healthy Living/Ageing, Consumer Health and Exercise & Fitness industries
• Discover the latest health and care funding opportunities and meet investors, enabling you to unlock collaborative new business opportunities, increase supply chain activities, and become a leading force in innovation.
• Build a community with other innovators from both inside and outside of your sector.

This programme will run from 11/02/2025 – 07/03/2025

* Please note that the Ignite Labs: Health & Care Innovations programme has been carefully curated for individuals who can commit to attending across the 4-week period. As spaces are limited, priority will be given to those who can attend the majority of events.

The expression of interest form includes selection questions that will be used to gauge suitability for the programme.

There are no fees associated with this programme; however, participants will be expected to pay for travel and accommodation.

Who is Magnetic?

Magnetic is a design innovation agency that will be offering a number of exciting design thinking workshops. These workshops are designed to search for unmet needs and help build a human centred approach to design and innovation that benefits your business, people (customers, partners or employees) and the planet.

Who is PDR Design?  

PDR Design has worked with organisations and projects around the world to integrate design into their ways of working. Prof. Anna Whicher, Professor of Design and Policy at PDR will deliver an exciting design for policy workshop that will apply design approaches to policy challenges in the health and care sector.

Who is Cofink?  

Cofink is a consultancy led by Tom Inns that advocates for using design and systems thinking to support collaboration to deliver innovation and change. Through hands-on workshop sessions, participants will map their stakeholders, their needs and the journeys they will need to navigate to bring innovations to market and achieve sales.

11 February 2025

09:30-13:00 GMT

In-Person Event: Workshop

Venue: UK National Innovation Centre for Ageing (NICA)

The Catalyst, 3 Science Square, Newcastle upon Tyne NE4 5TG

The inaugural event sets the tone, introducing the programme and facilitating connections. Expect insightful talks, interactive sessions, site visit and a roadmap for the transformative journey.

What to expect:

• Introduction to the Ignite Labs programme
• Rapid fire introductions
• Exploration of design concepts in health & care innovation
• Site tour at UK National Innovation Centre for Ageing (NICA)
• Networking Lunch

NB: The Design for Policy Workshop will follow straight after this session in the afternoon in same venue.

11 February 2025 13:00-17:00 GMT

In-Person Event: Workshop

Venue: UK National Innovation Centre for Ageing (NICA)

The Catalyst, 3 Science Square, Newcastle upon Tyne NE4 5TG

This half day workshop will apply design approaches to policy challenges in the health and care sector.

What to expect:

• Map the policy obstacles and opportunities experienced most often by companies in the sector.
• Select a short-list of obstacles/opportunities to explore in detail and co-design ideas to tackle them.

NB: This workshop follows the morning introduction session in the same venue.

12 February 2025 09:30-16:30 GMT

In-Person Event: Workshop

Venue: Malmaison Newcastle

104 Quayside, Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 3DX

This full day user research workshop will be exploring innovation opportunities in the UK’s health & care sector and has been designed for businesses with an interest in developing innovative solutions to the many challenges and opportunities associated with patient-centred health & care.

What to expect:

• Knowledge of how to use customer personas to develop empathy and drive human centred decisions
• Understanding the health & care ecosystem in which you are working (pathways, places, people)
• Mapping stakeholders in your health & care ecosystem (patients, professionals, policymakers, procurement, public, planet, partners)
• Mapping out the various stakeholder journeys your business will need to support.

20 February 2025 10:00-13:00 GMT

Online Event: Workshop – Zoom

Our design in innovation agency, Magnetic will lead a dynamic problem-definition workshop designed to spark actionable ideas that directly address real customer challenges in your business, paving the way for impactful solutions.

What to expect:

• Understand creative problem framing and how to use it in different situations
• Learn to create and improve problem statements to inspire innovative ideas
• Use divergent thinking to enhance the problem-solving process for unique and creative solutions.

24 February 2025 10:00-16:30 GMT

In-Person Event: Workshop

Venue: Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre (AMRC)

The University of Sheffield Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre Factory 2050 – Sheffield Business Park, Europa Avenue, Sheffield, S9 1ZA

This workshop is designed to help you shape your business proposition. You will be given the opportunity to explore different ideation techniques and how to evaluate various ideas.

What to expect:

• Understand the importance of framing your problem to support creative ideation
• Develop a human centred and empathetic approach to identifying and solving problems
• Explore different ideation techniques and how to evaluate various ideas
• Learn how to deconstruct your ideas
• Explore how design, healthcare and creative practices work together to address real world issues that impact on health and wellbeing.
• Site tour of AMRC Factory 2050 building

25 February 2025 10:00-13:00 GMT

Online Event: Workshop – Zoom

In this workshop led by Innovation and Design expert, John Bound, you will have the opportunity to use a tool that has created value for over 11,000 innovation leaders across the UK. The Innovation Canvas is a simple but effective tool which helps businesses commercialise product, service, process or management innovations.

What to expect:

• Introduce you to Innovate UK’s own innovation canvas: A tool for helping you keep your innovations evolving and spotting barriers to its development
• Evaluate existing projects or inform funding applications in 1 on 1 or team conversations
• Identify urgent challenges and prioritise solutions to reduce risk

7 March 2025 10:00-17:00 GMT

In-Person Event: Presentation Session

Venue: Advanced Wellbeing Research Centre (AWRC)

Sheffield Hallam University

The grand finale offers you the opportunity to showcase your projects to a panel of senior stakeholders, share valuable insights, and celebrate the transformative journey you’ve undertaken. It’s also a unique chance to network, reflect on the collective achievements of the programme, and highlight the impact of your work.

There will also be a site tour of the Advanced Wellbeing Research Centre (AWRC).

What to expect:

• Site tour of Advanced Wellbeing Research Centre
• Pitch your ideas and concepts to an expert panel
• Outline potential next steps for taking your idea further
• Final discussions and insights
• Celebration, networking, and reflections on the journey.