Edge Hill honours growth and innovation at awards

Edge Hill University’s SME Productivity & Innovation Centre celebrated the success of the businesses it has helped at its annual NW SME Growth & Innovation Awards 2022.

The evening featured six categories recognising impact and success in the fields of product and service innovation, leadership, job and skills creation and adoption of new technology.

Professor Simon Bolton, director of SME PIC, said: "The awards are a great opportunity for the SMEs that we have worked with to demonstrate their business success and showcase the impact. The work we do with businesses is pivotal to the development of highly-skilled job opportunities for our students and supporting academic knowledge exchange. Well done to all the shortlisted SMEs and winners.”

The award winners were:

Leadership for Growth Award
Winner: Blackpool Grand Theatre Ltd.
Highly Commended: Bright Engineering Ltd., Grow Traffic Ltd.

Skills for Growth Award
Winner: Markland Hill Wealth
Highly Commended: Red Rose Recovery Lancashire, Think Tank Academy

Technology Innovation Award
Winner: J Wareing and Son (Wrea Green) Ltd.
Highly Commended: Home Instead Chorley & West Lancashire, Panaz Ltd.

Product Innovation Award
Winner: Inovus Medical Ltd
Highly Commended: SolidTek Ltd., Wolfenden Concrete Ltd.

Service Innovation Award
Winner: Quality Teaching Staff
Highly Commended: Essentialise Workplace Wellbeing, School of Sign Language

Growth Strategy Award
Winner: Bright Engineering Ltd.
Highly Commended: The Progress Group, Reachout ASC

The Outstanding Achievement award was chosen by the judges and awarded to The Progress Group from Liverpool. The ground-breaking business enrols and educates ‘non-attender’ learners, providing a life-changing alternative to traditional education for anyone who can’t attend a physical school site by using a state-of-the-art multi-disciplinary software ecosystem.