New sponsors back Business Weekly Awards

Entries are flowing for the newly-launched Business Weekly Awards 2021-2022 competition which has an even stronger sponsor line-up.

Cambridge Science Park leads a tranche of new backers for the Awards which also includes Chesterford Research Park, Sir Chris Evans’ Excalibur Life Sciences and Mike Lynch’s Invoke Capital, which backs Cambridge tech companies such as Darktrace, Featurespace and Luminance.

All the existing heavyweight sponsors from the 2020-2021 Awards have renewed their backing. These include Arm, AstraZeneca, Barclays, PwC, Cambridge Innovation Capital and Cambridge University’s Judge Business School. 

Stand-out law firm Mills & Reeve continues as lead forensic sponsor, compiling reports for judges based on interviews with entrant businesses.
New this year is an award sponsored by Cambridge Innovation Capital to honour the Investment of the Year.

We are also looking for a Young Company of the Year, the best Quoted Company, champions in international trade and sustainability technology; Life Science innovators, top women and academic entrepreneurs; disruptive technology game-changers and AI thought leaders.The award categories are:

Young Company of the Year: For the most exciting startup enterprise in any sector that has made significant progress in the last 12 months.

Graduate Business of the Year: For a Cambridge-based company that has shown outstanding commercial potential or success over the last 12 months, either founded by a Cambridge University alumnus or which has significantly contributed to the employment and retention locally of Cambridge graduate talent. 

The Michael Marshall Engineering Excellence Award: For a company or individual who in the last 12 months has added game-changing engineering to any product in any business & industry.

Disruptive Technology: For the company in any sector whose science or technology is deemed to be genuinely game-changing.

Technology Scale-up: For the hi-tech company that in the previous 12 months has broadened its market reach globally, scaled headcount in a major way, secured significantly increased investment or added noticeable power to its core technology proposition.

Life Science Scale-up: For the Life Science business that has shown most progress in the preceding 12 months in terms of scaling headcount, broadening vertical markets or increasing the potency of its pipeline.

International Trade Champion: For a company in any industry that has significantly broadened its export sales or access to global markets.

Lifetime Achievement Award: To recognise an extraordinary career devoted to innovation and commercial success for the benefit of society and the UK economy.

Life Science Innovation: For the organisation or individual who has done the most to further the cause of life science discovery for the benefit of human healthcare.

Cambridge Judge Business School Woman Entrepreneur of the Year: For a woman entrepreneur who can demonstrate outstanding achievements in the last 12 months and who inspires and nurtures other women to excel. 

Sustainability Champion: For the company whose science or technology is deemed to hold most potential to dramatically reduce or eliminate the carbon footprint of businesses and industries.

Academic Entrepreneur of the Year: For outstanding work by an academic as an innovator, founder or consultant in the past 12 months.

AI Innovation: For the most successful deployment of Artificial Intelligence in any business segment.

Quoted Company of The Year: For an East of England business listed on any public market that has delivered best value for shareholders in the last 12 months.

Investment of the Year: For a deal that is deemed to be a game-changer in terms of amount invested or potential impact following investment, regardless of the amount of money raised.

From these a Business of the Year will be selected to join a Hall of Fame that includes Abcam, ARM, Autonomy, AVEVA, British Sugar, Cambridge Quantum, CSR, Darktrace, Domino, Frontier Developments, Horizon Discovery, Ieso Digital Health, Perkins Engines, Pi Group, Ryanair, TTP and Treatt plc.

• To enter the awards visit https://www.businessweekly.co.uk/business-awards/enter-awards or email Tony Quested –  tquested@businessweekly.co.uk