Biocampus can be ‘Liverpool Two’, says Liverpool One visionary Rod Holmes
The man behind Liverpool’s transformational Liverpool One development has today branded a radical vision to make the city a world-leader in Life Sciences as ‘Liverpool Two’.
Mersey Partnership Chair, Rodney Holmes, who was Project Director for Grosvenor’s £1bn investment in Liverpool City Centre, was speaking at a Labour Party Conference Fringe meeting organised by the think-tank Centre for Cities.
Mr Holmes told the gathering of political and business leaders that the renewal of Liverpool’s retail core was an essential task in the creation of a vibrant and functional city centre. However, it was now vital that the city focused on delivering the economic infrastructure on which it could build sustainable long-term prosperity.
He explained: “The vision for 2 million square ft of life science investment at Liverpool Bio Campus, encompassing one of Europe’s biggest clusters of bio-businesses, research facilities and a state-of the-art new teaching hospital, is absolutely vital to Liverpool’s economic future.
“We have a unique set of internationally renowned research assets, a cluster of successful life science businesses and a fantastic city centre location in the heart of our Knowledge Quarter. As a City Region we need to focus all our efforts on realising this kind of potential. This is Liverpool Two”
The building of the Bio Campus and the new Royal will spearhead the biggest private development the city has seen since Liverpool One, transforming the city into a global player in medical research and life sciences.
The Bio Campus, adjacent to the new Royal, The University of Liverpool and The School of Tropical Medicine, will create a unique geographical cluster of innovative SME’s, world-class academic and clinical research facilities working together to bring new technologies to the market place.
Mr Holmes’ comments were welcomed by Tony Bell, Chief Executive of The Royal Liverpool and Broadgreen University Hospital Trust, which is spearheading the development of the Bio Campus project. He said: “The key to successful knowledge economies is being able to connect academic and research assets to emerging technologies with major market potential. It’s the Silicone Valley model and it’s something that the Bio Campus has been designed to emulate. Grosvenor’s Liverpool One project kick started the renewal of Liverpool city centre, and I agree with Rodney that there are compelling parallels.
“It’s a development of equivalent physical scale, but with a potentially much bigger long-term impact. More than any other specific project this development can define what Liverpool’s future economy is about.”
Mike Parker, Chairman of the Bio Campus board and Chairman of Liverpool Vision, the city’s economic development company, added: “In addition to our world class researchers and our globally competitive business base, a real strength of the Bio Campus, and one that differentiates it from other biomedical clusters, is the close physical proximity of its key assets in a vibrant urban setting grouped together with other assets in the city’s Knowledge Quarter.
“This Quarter is crucial in helping to promote Liverpool as an international destination for scientists, academics and students and will in turn help propel Liverpool’s reputation as centre of excellence and to nurture lifelong innovation and creativity.”
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