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clearsons tabloid 21/3/07 16:19

FOCUS REPORT Monday March 19 2007

ECONOMIC PISTON PAGE 2 RESEARCH HOTHOUSE PAGE 6 CLASS ACT PAGE 13

NewThinkersWelcome

ENGLAND’SNORTH WEST


THE North-West region is acountry within a country suchis its economic clout, its educa-tional and research base, thestrength and innovation of itsindustries and the beauty of itscountryside. Its £106 billioneconomy dwarfs anything out-side the South East and islarger than many economieson the European mainland.

Bryan Gray, chairman ofthe North West Regional De-velopment Agency, says: “Fortoo long we have looked toLondon and the South East tobe the economic engine of thecountry. The UK needs a

second economic piston andthe North generally, and thearea centred around the Man-chester-Leeds axis, is thatsecond piston.”

But more impressive thanthe picture painted by the sta-tistics is the enormous sense ofcohesion that permeates theacademic and research sectorsas they co-operate to developthemodern research in the cre-ative and digital, biotechnologi-cal and advanced engineering,sectors that are the region’sfuture. That unified sense of di-rection links a cluster of univer-sities and research facilitiesthat match any in the country.

The region has it all, fromthe cutting-edge research ofthe Daresbury Campus, Eu-rope’s biggest area of biotechproduction at Speke, engineer-ing excellence of the Bentleyand BAe plants to some of thefinest professional servicescompanies, in banking, ac-countancy and law, to befound anywhere in Europe.

Put that together with con-

nectivity to the United States,with five flights a day to NewYork, almost on par with thatto London which offers achoice of 50 trains a day to thecapital and you have a combi-nation of business facets thatis hard to beat.

Stephen Broomhead, chiefexecutive of the North WestRegional Development Agen-cy, says: “We are never compla-cent but we are a region thathas a very good public-privaterelationship. The universitieswork very closely together andwith others around science andinnovation. We are all seen tobe pulling together and that iswhy laterally we have beenhaving a good deal of success.”

One analyst adds: “TheNorth West is a very competi-tive cluster in the internationalmarketplace and it needs tohave its self-awareness raisedto be more effective as a singlecluster because on a globalscale that is the way we makean impact. The thing that al-ways distorts the picture is Lon-don. If you step back and lookat Europe overall, the NorthWest is the next biggest clusterof businesses in Europe, notjust the second in the UK, butbecause we have got the 800lbgorilla of London it is not amessage that ever gets out.”

The most revolutionary de-parture is the plan for the UK’sfirst purpose-built media cityin Salford. It will provide a cre-ative centre for media compa-nies to share high quality facili-ties. Mediacity is also expectedto play host to a radical depar-ture by the BBC when itmoves a number of its depart-ments from London and be-comes the anchor tenant andcatalyst for a whole new digitalfuture for the region.

With the Lake District andLancashire coast beaches closeat hand some of the finest rec-reational areas in the country

are just a short drive away. Sixpremiership football clubs arewithin easy reach not to men-tion several first class rugbyclubs and the county cricketclub of Lancashire.

But it is the world of golfthat the region truly excels.The Golf Coast has the highestconcentration of champion-ship links courses in the worldand boasts three of the top 20.Royal Birkdale will stage TheOpen in 2008 but even forthose who do not aspire tothat level of play, there are astring of fine courses runningdown the coast from Silloth inCumbria to the Wirral.

The region’s artistic ambi-tions are as ambitious as its cre-ative and industrial ones, start-ing with this year’s Manches-ter International Festival. Thisyear the festival will be head-lined by an extraordinary Chi-nese offering, a dazzling circusopera for the 21st Centurybased on an ancient Chineselegend titled Monkey: Journeyto the West. It promises to be abrilliant spectacle featuringmore than 40 Chinese acro-bats, Chinese vocalists and per-forming martial artists.

Liverpool is working to-wards a transformational expe-

rience next year when it is Euro-pean Capital of Culture. Thecity has taken on the services ofProfessor Drummond Bone,vice-chancellor of LiverpoolUniversity and chairman of theLiverpool Culture Company.

Bone was one of the mov-ing forces behind the successof Glasgow’s year as Europeanculture capital and says thatwhile his native Glasgow fo-

cused on traditional culture,the experience at Liverpoolwould feature more communi-ty participation, “but withoutneglecting the Berlin Phils ofthis world and a big exhibitionof Gustav Klimpt.” He addsthat the community aspect isone of the key reasons why thecity won the nomination.

He is lobbying for theBeatles to appear on £20 notes

and says: “You can feel that thewhole city is involved. The cul-ture is deeply imbedded here.It is something that you do notfeel in a city like London. Ifyou go into a bar there and sayyou are a professor of literaturethat would kill the conversa-tion whereas in Liverpool thechap sitting next to you will tellyou what he is reading and askyour opinion of a poet.”

He adds that the spin offfor Liverpool will be a boost inits self-confidence as has hap-pened in Glasgow. “If you’vegot a city that is sure of itself itis a good place to be and thebenefits are economic.”

0 The Northwest RegionalDevelopment Agency (NWDA)was established in 1999 toprovide business-leddirection to the region’seconomic development andto establish economicpriorities.0 The North West’s economyis the third largest in thecountry, with 6.8 millionpeople and 230,000 firmspowering a £106 billioneconomy.

0 Between 2000 and 2004,the Northwest created180,000 news jobs and grewat a faster rate than theEnglish average.0 Since its inception theagency has: created orsafeguarded 161,200 jobs;reclaimed 3,700 hectares ofbrownfield land, an area thesize of Blackpool; levered£2.1 billion of private sectorinvestment and created12,000 new businesses.

0 In the first five years ofthe new century the value ofregional exports rose by£2.3 billion to £19.1 billionwith an additional 1,100companies now exporting.0 The Northwest is currentlythe third highest exporter ofthe English regions.0 Digital-based industriesmake a key contribution with5,000 firms with 63,000staff with an annual turnoverof £6.45 billion.

0 The region is home tomore than 80 banks and thefinancial and businessservices sector employsmore people than anywhereelse in the UK outsideLondon and the South East.It employs 172,000 peoplein a sector which is valued atmore than £9 billion.0 The region is the secondlargest legal centre with1,800 legal servicecompanies.

0 The financial andprofessional services sectorgenerated £7.3 billion in theyear 2000 and employed280,000.0 The region’s 230biomedical companies,include seven multinationals.

They employ 25,000 peopleand export pharmaceuticalsworth £3.4 billion a year.0 Its aerospace sector is thelargest in the country, worth£3 billion, while 450automotive firms have aturnover of £9 billion.

FACTS AND FIGURES FROM THE NORTH WEST REGION

Economic pistonthat drives theregion forward

‘We are a regionthat has a verygood public-privaterelationship’

He is lobbyingfor the Beatlesto appear on£20 notes

David Watts reports on the surging, vibrantenergy of the North West’s people and places

For further information see:www.t imesonl ine.co.uk/newthinkerswelcome

FOCUS REPORTS: Editor: Isobel Shepherd Smith,020-7782 5064, [email protected] Features: Jessica Taplin,020-7782 7185, [email protected]: Marta Pérez

Cockermouth

Carlisle

Maryport Cockermouth

Wigton

Brampton

Ulverston

Carnforth

Heysham

Fleetwood

Garstang Colne

Halifax

Penrith

KeswickWorkington

Whitehaven

Barrow-in-Furness

Lancaster

MANCHESTER

LIVERPOOL

Blackpool

PrestonBurnley

Blackburn

Bolton

Chester

Morecambe

Kendal

Ambleside

Sellafield

Gretna

Windermere

Lytham St Anne’s

Wigan

St Helens Crosby

Bury

Birkenhead Wallasey

Southport

Formby

Warton

Salmesbury

Rochdale

Oldham

Salford

WarringtonWidnesHalewood

Runcorn

Ormskirk

AlderleyEdge

Wilmslow

Stoke-on-Trent

Newcastle-under-Lyme

Crewe

Nantwich

Stockport

Wrexham

Lake

Distr ict

Forest of

Bowland

EllesmerePort

M6

M6

M6

M58

M57

M53

M61 M66

M65

M62

M62

M60

M56

M55

DerwentWater

ConistonWater

Windermere

Ullswater

SCOTLAND

WALES

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Wirral

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Isle ofWalney

I R I S HS E A

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NORTHUMBERLAND

DURHAM

NORTHYORKSHIRE

CUMBRIA

LANCASHIRE

CHESHIRE

A66

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A69

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A59

A56

A59

A580

A34

A483

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A595

A590

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20 miles

www.investinenglandsnorthwest.com2 NORTH WEST ENGLAND 1GX THE TIMES 19 MARCH 2007


Manchester is thetop draw for UKaspiring students

MERSEYSIDE, like otherparts of the North West, is onthe up. Strong economic per-formance, record levels of in-vestment, regeneration of itsolder urban areas, high rates ofgrowth in output and job crea-tion, booming property pricesand a growing sense of prideand optimism have replacedyears of industrial strife, urbandecay and widespread disillu-sionment in the 1970s and1980s.The extent of the physical

changes currently transform-ing Liverpool is striking. Towercranes dominate the city’s sky-line, famous for The ThreeGraces at the waterfront, andan army of workers is busy re-generating many sites, knownas the Big Dig.The new glass and chrome

shopping and commercial de-velopments underline that thisis a city buzzing with renewedenergy and confidence, befit-ting a great city celebrating its800th birthday this year.Liverpool’s European Capi-

tal of Culture 2008 is the cata-lyst for drawing together thecity’s and region’s outstandingcultural, leisure, sport andretail facilities into the biggest

year-long programme of cul-ture that Europe has seen.Next year, the Turner Prize

will, for the first time, be award-ed outside London at the Liver-pool Tate Gallery to coincidewith the Capital of Culture cel-ebrations. Winning the titlehas raised the region’s profilenationally and internationally.The £920 million Grosvenor

development is the single mostimportant component in theregeneration of Liverpool citycentre. With 1 million sq ft ofretail space for flagship depart-ment stores, 90 new shops andanother 1 million sq ft of ancil-lary leisure and residential de-velopment, Liverpool One willcreate 4,500 jobs and catapultLiverpool into the top five ofUK retail destinations.The region hosts global

sports events and facilitiessuch as the Aintree Grand Na-tional, the Open Golf Champi-onship at Royal Liverpool GolfClub, Hoylake last year andRoyal Birkdale in 2008, twotop football clubs with Liver-pool FC the Champions ofEurope in 2005, major racemeetings at Haydock and Ches-ter and the Tall Ships 2008.Tourism is already the fast-

est growing sector of the Mer-seyside economy. The impactof Capital of Culture will create13,500 new jobs, attracting inexcess of 11 million visits to Liv-erpool and a forecast visitorspend of £550 million in 2008.Other outstanding tourist jew-els in the NorthWest are set tobenefit, too, including Chester,

the Lake District and the Snow-donia National Park.A new cruise liner facility at

the Pier Head will bring 40 bigships into the Mersey a year,opening up new premium inter-national visitor markets for thecity and the North West.Residential developments

are starting to breathe new lifeinto tired but inherently spec-tacular old buildings. Liver-pool has three universities andtens of thousands of students,many from overseas, are rein-venting the urban centre by in-troducing a cool atmospherein bars, restaurants and clubs.

The city is known across theworld for its musical heritage,founded on its most famoussons, The Beatles. Today, themusic scene continues tothrive and, mixed with thewarmth of its people and their“Scouse” wit, gives Liverpoolits unique brand.Passenger numbers at Liver-

pool John Lennon Airporthave increased eight-fold since1997 and broke the 5 millionannual passenger mark in Feb-ruary 2007.Liverpool’s rise to pre-emi-

nence was based on the role ofthe port in the development ofworld trade. Today,the MerseyPorts are a national asset,handling about 40 milliontonnes of cargo per year. ThePort of Liverpool supports thegrowing container tradebetween the North of Englandand the rest of the world.It is the largest Free Zone in

the UK and is strategically lo-cated within 60km of the larg-est population and export-gen-erating region of any UK portoutside London. Merseyside’sfuture is most certainly set fair.

Robert Hough is deputy chair-man of Peel Holdings

Merseyside transformed

WHEN you realise that Man-chester University is the mostpopular destination for UKstudents, it becomes clear whythe region is well on the wayto matching the intellectualfirepower of the South Eastand Oxbridge.The other regional heavy-

weights in the academicstakes are Liverpool and Lan-caster. Manchester receivedthe most applications —59,522 — for its undergradu-ate courses starting last Sep-tember, statistics from the Uni-versities Central AdmissionsService reveal (ManchesterMetropolitan University isNo.5 on the list).When Alan Gilbert arrived

in the city as vice chancellorfrom Melbourne in 2004, hisobjective was to make Man-chester one of the world’s fin-est universities by 2015,ranked among the world’s top25 research institutions.He is in the happy position

of starting with some formid-able foundations for his ambi-tions since there are 22 win-ners of Nobel prizes amongcurrent and former staff. Fur-thermore the university can

claim a crucial role in two ofthe greatest advances of the20th century.The nuclear age was born in

Manchester with Ernest Ru-therford’s pioneering re-search that led to the splittingof the atom, and the computerrevolution began in the city in1948 when a machine, knownas The Baby, built by Tom Kil-burn and Freddie Williams,ran its first stored programme.The university is also

involved in the biggest capitalspending programme — £630million — in British highereducation, aimed at attractingthe best international schol-ars and students.Over at Liverpool Universi-

ty, Drummond Bone, the vicechancellor, points to twopowerful research institutes atLiverpool that are at the cut-ting edge of today’s science.They are the National Centrefor Zoonosis Research, whichinvestigates diseases transmis-sible between animals andhumans, and the CockcroftInstitute, an internationalcentre for research in accelera-tor science and technology.DAVID WATTS

On the waterfront: tower cranes now dominate Liverpool city centre and an army of workers is busy regenerating many sites

Passengers atLiverpool airporthave passed the5 million mark

Robert Hough on a region that has not stopped growing

Top spot: Manchester University had 59,522 applications last year

PAUL COUSANS

www.investinenglandsnorthwest.com

Manchester is thetop draw for UKaspiring students

MERSEYSIDE, like otherparts of the North West, is onthe up. Strong economic per-formance, record levels of in-vestment, regeneration of itsolder urban areas, high rates ofgrowth in output and job crea-tion, booming property pricesand a growing sense of prideand optimism have replacedyears of industrial strife, urbandecay and widespread disillu-sionment in the 1970s and1980s.The extent of the physical

changes currently transform-ing Liverpool is striking. Towercranes dominate the city’s sky-line, famous for The ThreeGraces at the waterfront, andan army of workers is busy re-generating many sites, knownas the Big Dig.The new glass and chrome

shopping and commercial de-velopments underline that thisis a city buzzing with renewedenergy and confidence, befit-ting a great city celebrating its800th birthday this year.Liverpool’s European Capi-

tal of Culture 2008 is the cata-lyst for drawing together thecity’s and region’s outstandingcultural, leisure, sport andretail facilities into the biggest

year-long programme of cul-ture that Europe has seen.Next year, the Turner Prize

will, for the first time, be award-ed outside London at the Liver-pool Tate Gallery to coincidewith the Capital of Culture cel-ebrations. Winning the titlehas raised the region’s profilenationally and internationally.The £920 million Grosvenor

development is the single mostimportant component in theregeneration of Liverpool citycentre. With 1 million sq ft ofretail space for flagship depart-ment stores, 90 new shops andanother 1 million sq ft of ancil-lary leisure and residential de-velopment, Liverpool One willcreate 4,500 jobs and catapultLiverpool into the top five ofUK retail destinations.The region hosts global

sports events and facilitiessuch as the Aintree Grand Na-tional, the Open Golf Champi-onship at Royal Liverpool GolfClub, Hoylake last year andRoyal Birkdale in 2008, twotop football clubs with Liver-pool FC the Champions ofEurope in 2005, major racemeetings at Haydock and Ches-ter and the Tall Ships 2008.Tourism is already the fast-

est growing sector of the Mer-seyside economy. The impactof Capital of Culture will create13,500 new jobs, attracting inexcess of 11 million visits to Liv-erpool and a forecast visitorspend of £550 million in 2008.Other outstanding tourist jew-els in the NorthWest are set tobenefit, too, including Chester,

the Lake District and the Snow-donia National Park.A new cruise liner facility at

the Pier Head will bring 40 bigships into the Mersey a year,opening up new premium inter-national visitor markets for thecity and the North West.Residential developments

are starting to breathe new lifeinto tired but inherently spec-tacular old buildings. Liver-pool has three universities andtens of thousands of students,many from overseas, are rein-venting the urban centre by in-troducing a cool atmospherein bars, restaurants and clubs.

The city is known across theworld for its musical heritage,founded on its most famoussons, The Beatles. Today, themusic scene continues tothrive and, mixed with thewarmth of its people and their“Scouse” wit, gives Liverpoolits unique brand.Passenger numbers at Liver-

pool John Lennon Airporthave increased eight-fold since1997 and broke the 5 millionannual passenger mark in Feb-ruary 2007.Liverpool’s rise to pre-emi-

nence was based on the role ofthe port in the development ofworld trade. Today,the MerseyPorts are a national asset,handling about 40 milliontonnes of cargo per year. ThePort of Liverpool supports thegrowing container tradebetween the North of Englandand the rest of the world.It is the largest Free Zone in

the UK and is strategically lo-cated within 60km of the larg-est population and export-gen-erating region of any UK portoutside London. Merseyside’sfuture is most certainly set fair.

Robert Hough is deputy chair-man of Peel Holdings

Merseyside transformed

WHEN you realise that Man-chester University is the mostpopular destination for UKstudents, it becomes clear whythe region is well on the wayto matching the intellectualfirepower of the South Eastand Oxbridge.The other regional heavy-

weights in the academicstakes are Liverpool and Lan-caster. Manchester receivedthe most applications —59,522 — for its undergradu-ate courses starting last Sep-tember, statistics from the Uni-versities Central AdmissionsService reveal (ManchesterMetropolitan University isNo.5 on the list).When Alan Gilbert arrived

in the city as vice chancellorfrom Melbourne in 2004, hisobjective was to make Man-chester one of the world’s fin-est universities by 2015,ranked among the world’s top25 research institutions.He is in the happy position

of starting with some formid-able foundations for his ambi-tions since there are 22 win-ners of Nobel prizes amongcurrent and former staff. Fur-thermore the university can

claim a crucial role in two ofthe greatest advances of the20th century.The nuclear age was born in

Manchester with Ernest Ru-therford’s pioneering re-search that led to the splittingof the atom, and the computerrevolution began in the city in1948 when a machine, knownas The Baby, built by Tom Kil-burn and Freddie Williams,ran its first stored programme.The university is also

involved in the biggest capitalspending programme — £630million — in British highereducation, aimed at attractingthe best international schol-ars and students.Over at Liverpool Universi-

ty, Drummond Bone, the vicechancellor, points to twopowerful research institutes atLiverpool that are at the cut-ting edge of today’s science.They are the National Centrefor Zoonosis Research, whichinvestigates diseases transmis-sible between animals andhumans, and the CockcroftInstitute, an internationalcentre for research in accelera-tor science and technology.DAVID WATTS

On the waterfront: tower cranes now dominate Liverpool city centre and an army of workers is busy regenerating many sites

Passengers atLiverpool airporthave passed the5 million mark

Robert Hough on a region that has not stopped growing

Top spot: Manchester University had 59,522 applications last year

PAUL COUSANS

www.investinenglandsnorthwest.comTHE TIMES 19 MARCH 2007 1GX NORTH WEST ENGLAND 3


RUTH Matthews and JamesBurnie — a husband and wifeacademic team — have devel-oped a novel antibody-basedtherapy to combat potentiallylethal microbes, including theMRSA superbug. Their unor-thodox approach to treatinglife-threatening infections hasalso made them millionaires.

The couple, both professorsand medical doctors, startedout at the University of Man-chester 26 years ago. Theirquest was to decipher whysome people are more suscepti-ble than others to infections.

“We looked at the blood ofpeople who survived infectiousdisease and those who didn’t,”says Burnie, chief executive ofNeuTec Pharma, the biotech-nology pharmaceuticals com-pany set up by the couple.“What we found is that thosewho live have antibodiesagainst a protein called heatshock protein 90, those whodie, don’t have the antibody."

It soon became clear thatthe university professors wereonto a finding of enormouspotential value. Their discov-ery may signal a new era in thetreatment of infectious dis-eases. To take their idea to

market, the researchers be-came entrepreneurs and set upNeuTec in 1997.

Their strategy relied onidentifying those naturally oc-curring antibodies frompatients who recover from aninfection. Those antibodies,part of the body’s immunedefence mechanisms, servedas the blueprint for Matthewsand Burnie to generate “geneti-cally recombinant antibodies” ,known as grabs.

Next they asked whetherthose grabs could help infectedpatients become survivors.

The work progressed well. Apivotal clinical trial showedthat the drug Mycograb, de-signed to target fungal candidainfections, when combinedwith a conventional anti-fun-gal treatment, dramatically cutthe number of deaths fromyeast infections. With conven-tional therapy for systemic can-didiasis, one in five patients

die; adding the grab antibodiesreduced deaths to one in 25.“It’s a big difference. That’swhat makes it such an attrac-tive drug,” says Burnie.

The yeast candida albicansis the most common species inthe human gut. Most of thetime, it is usually harmless butit can cause a range of trivial in-fections, including vaginitis.

But if this organism in-vades the blood, the infectioncan be deadly. Patients withcompromised immune sys-tems, such as those with HIV/Aids or undergoing organtransplants are especially atrisk, as are babies bornseverely under weight.

Yeast can be difficult totreat. “Fungal infections arequite frequent in intensivecare units. Existing treatmentsare effective but can be verytoxic," says Professor TomEvans, an infectious diseasespecialist at the University ofGlasgow. “Mycograb is target-ing a genuine problem. Theirproduct shows promise.“

Interest in NeuTec’s anti-body-therapy soared and thecompany was floated on thestock market.

Last summer Novartis, the

Swiss pharmaceutical multima-tional, bought the start-upcompany for £304 million,earning the investigators a £21windfall and £13 million for theUniversity of Manchester,which helped Matthews andBurnie to commercialise their

research. The company is alsodeveloping Aurograb, a grabaimed at the MRSA superbug.This strain of bacteria has be-come endemic in hospitalsaround the world and blood-stream infections often haveproved lethal.The need for

more effective therapies totackle deadly infections, suchas MRSA, is urgent, but it cantake years to develop new anti-biotics.

The hope is that NeuTec’snovel pharmaceuticals mayavert the impending threat.

Millionaires fromantibody researchLisa Melton finds how a Manchester husbandand wife team tackled infectious diseases

IT WAS an unusual projectfor the day — local business-men led by shipowner Sir Al-fred Lewis Jones set up Liver-pool’s School of Tropical Med-icine. Founded in 1898, it wasthe first institution of its kind.Within a few years, numerousexpeditions were launched tothe tropics.

“The school was set up tounderstand tropical diseasesand our mission has notchanged since,” says Profes-sor Janet Hemingway, theschool’s director, “We are stillat the forefront of understand-ing and treatment of diseasesas we were then and we arestill industry-friendly.”

A new centre for tropicaland infectious diseases is duefor completion by the end ofthis year, which will doublethe school’s size as well as sig-nificantly boosting Mersey-side’s developing biotechnolo-gy industry.

”We are aiming to becomethe premier school of tropicaland infectious diseases inEurope,” says Hemingway. Inthe past four years the institu-tion has increased its turno-ver by £16 million and hopesto double that within the nextfive years boosted by incomefrom three large researchprojects. Two are being fund-ed by the Bill & Melinda

Gates Foundation — oneaimed at eradicating sleepingsickness caused by the tsetsefly; the other to develop safer,and more effective insecti-cides to control mosquitoes.

Professor Mike Lehane,who is heading the fly project,is focusing on what odoursflies do and do not like to de-

velop better attractants for in-sect traps and more effectiverepellents. “Tsetse control cur-rently relies on insecticides,which are usually delivered byaerial or ground spraying butthis is costly, raises environ-mental concerns and is ineffi-cient,” he says. “Protection bypersonal repellents would re-

duce the individual’s depend-ence on government or do-nor-funded interventions.”

His team proposes to firstidentify the smells that attractand repel the blood-suckinginsect, then discover whichmolecules are detected by thefly’s antennae. The work iscrucial: five major species of

tsetse fly transmit the diseasein more than 30 countries insub-Saharan Africa, whichputs millions of people at risk.

The mosquito project isdear to Hemingway’s heart.Originally a geneticist bytraining, she says, “I wantedto do something that was eco-nomically and socially impor-

tant.” Controlling mosquitoeshas been the key to control-ling malaria, but mosquitoesare developing resistance toinsecticides. “We need new in-secticides that are up to thetask and are safe for humansand the environment.”

Malaria affects 40 per centof the world’s population inmore than 100 countries. If un-treated, it can prove fatal.

Hemingway believes thatpart of the school’s success isdue to its innovative approach— by involving partnershipswith industry and other organ-isations and by applying itswork to have the maximumimpact. “For instance, we candeal with malaria from benchto bedside by developing newdrugs, looking at how drug re-sistance develops, developinggovernment policy and exam-ining the effectiveness ofthose policies in practice.”

It is fitting that the institu-tion has been awarded thisgrant. Sir Ronald Ross, whojoined the school in 1899, be-came the first British winnerof a Nobel prize in medicinewhen, in 1902, he was recog-nised for his discovery thatmalaria is carried by mosqui-toes. Scientists at the schoolthen went on to develop thefirst drug to treat malaria.SANJIDA O’CONNELL

‘It’s a big difference.That’s whatmakes it such anattractive drug’

Vital job: Amanda Ball, laboratory manager at Liverpool’s School of Tropical Medicine, who works with mosquitoes and tsetse flies

Liverpool institution aims to be best in Europe

In focus: Ruth Matthews and James Burnie developed a therapy to combat microbes, including MRSA

JASON LOCK/MEN

BARRY GREENWOOD


RUTH Matthews and JamesBurnie — a husband and wifeacademic team — have devel-oped a novel antibody-basedtherapy to combat potentiallylethal microbes, including theMRSA superbug. Their unor-thodox approach to treatinglife-threatening infections hasalso made them millionaires.

The couple, both professorsand medical doctors, startedout at the University of Man-chester 26 years ago. Theirquest was to decipher whysome people are more suscepti-ble than others to infections.

“We looked at the blood ofpeople who survived infectiousdisease and those who didn’t,”says Burnie, chief executive ofNeuTec Pharma, the biotech-nology pharmaceuticals com-pany set up by the couple.“What we found is that thosewho live have antibodiesagainst a protein called heatshock protein 90, those whodie, don’t have the antibody."

It soon became clear thatthe university professors wereonto a finding of enormouspotential value. Their discov-ery may signal a new era in thetreatment of infectious dis-eases. To take their idea to

market, the researchers be-came entrepreneurs and set upNeuTec in 1997.

Their strategy relied onidentifying those naturally oc-curring antibodies frompatients who recover from aninfection. Those antibodies,part of the body’s immunedefence mechanisms, servedas the blueprint for Matthewsand Burnie to generate “geneti-cally recombinant antibodies” ,known as grabs.

Next they asked whetherthose grabs could help infectedpatients become survivors.

The work progressed well. Apivotal clinical trial showedthat the drug Mycograb, de-signed to target fungal candidainfections, when combinedwith a conventional anti-fun-gal treatment, dramatically cutthe number of deaths fromyeast infections. With conven-tional therapy for systemic can-didiasis, one in five patients

die; adding the grab antibodiesreduced deaths to one in 25.“It’s a big difference. That’swhat makes it such an attrac-tive drug,” says Burnie.

The yeast candida albicansis the most common species inthe human gut. Most of thetime, it is usually harmless butit can cause a range of trivial in-fections, including vaginitis.

But if this organism in-vades the blood, the infectioncan be deadly. Patients withcompromised immune sys-tems, such as those with HIV/Aids or undergoing organtransplants are especially atrisk, as are babies bornseverely under weight.

Yeast can be difficult totreat. “Fungal infections arequite frequent in intensivecare units. Existing treatmentsare effective but can be verytoxic," says Professor TomEvans, an infectious diseasespecialist at the University ofGlasgow. “Mycograb is target-ing a genuine problem. Theirproduct shows promise.“

Interest in NeuTec’s anti-body-therapy soared and thecompany was floated on thestock market.

Last summer Novartis, the

Swiss pharmaceutical multima-tional, bought the start-upcompany for £304 million,earning the investigators a £21windfall and £13 million for theUniversity of Manchester,which helped Matthews andBurnie to commercialise their

research. The company is alsodeveloping Aurograb, a grabaimed at the MRSA superbug.This strain of bacteria has be-come endemic in hospitalsaround the world and blood-stream infections often haveproved lethal.The need for

more effective therapies totackle deadly infections, suchas MRSA, is urgent, but it cantake years to develop new anti-biotics.

The hope is that NeuTec’snovel pharmaceuticals mayavert the impending threat.

Millionaires fromantibody researchLisa Melton finds how a Manchester husbandand wife team tackled infectious diseases

IT WAS an unusual projectfor the day — local business-men led by shipowner Sir Al-fred Lewis Jones set up Liver-pool’s School of Tropical Med-icine. Founded in 1898, it wasthe first institution of its kind.Within a few years, numerousexpeditions were launched tothe tropics.

“The school was set up tounderstand tropical diseasesand our mission has notchanged since,” says Profes-sor Janet Hemingway, theschool’s director, “We are stillat the forefront of understand-ing and treatment of diseasesas we were then and we arestill industry-friendly.”

A new centre for tropicaland infectious diseases is duefor completion by the end ofthis year, which will doublethe school’s size as well as sig-nificantly boosting Mersey-side’s developing biotechnolo-gy industry.

”We are aiming to becomethe premier school of tropicaland infectious diseases inEurope,” says Hemingway. Inthe past four years the institu-tion has increased its turno-ver by £16 million and hopesto double that within the nextfive years boosted by incomefrom three large researchprojects. Two are being fund-ed by the Bill & Melinda

Gates Foundation — oneaimed at eradicating sleepingsickness caused by the tsetsefly; the other to develop safer,and more effective insecti-cides to control mosquitoes.

Professor Mike Lehane,who is heading the fly project,is focusing on what odoursflies do and do not like to de-

velop better attractants for in-sect traps and more effectiverepellents. “Tsetse control cur-rently relies on insecticides,which are usually delivered byaerial or ground spraying butthis is costly, raises environ-mental concerns and is ineffi-cient,” he says. “Protection bypersonal repellents would re-

duce the individual’s depend-ence on government or do-nor-funded interventions.”

His team proposes to firstidentify the smells that attractand repel the blood-suckinginsect, then discover whichmolecules are detected by thefly’s antennae. The work iscrucial: five major species of

tsetse fly transmit the diseasein more than 30 countries insub-Saharan Africa, whichputs millions of people at risk.

The mosquito project isdear to Hemingway’s heart.Originally a geneticist bytraining, she says, “I wantedto do something that was eco-nomically and socially impor-

tant.” Controlling mosquitoeshas been the key to control-ling malaria, but mosquitoesare developing resistance toinsecticides. “We need new in-secticides that are up to thetask and are safe for humansand the environment.”

Malaria affects 40 per centof the world’s population inmore than 100 countries. If un-treated, it can prove fatal.

Hemingway believes thatpart of the school’s success isdue to its innovative approach— by involving partnershipswith industry and other organ-isations and by applying itswork to have the maximumimpact. “For instance, we candeal with malaria from benchto bedside by developing newdrugs, looking at how drug re-sistance develops, developinggovernment policy and exam-ining the effectiveness ofthose policies in practice.”

It is fitting that the institu-tion has been awarded thisgrant. Sir Ronald Ross, whojoined the school in 1899, be-came the first British winnerof a Nobel prize in medicinewhen, in 1902, he was recog-nised for his discovery thatmalaria is carried by mosqui-toes. Scientists at the schoolthen went on to develop thefirst drug to treat malaria.SANJIDA O’CONNELL

‘It’s a big difference.That’s whatmakes it such anattractive drug’

Vital job: Amanda Ball, laboratory manager at Liverpool’s School of Tropical Medicine, who works with mosquitoes and tsetse flies

Liverpool institution aims to be best in Europe

In focus: Ruth Matthews and James Burnie developed a therapy to combat microbes, including MRSA

JASON LOCK/MEN

BARRY GREENWOOD



YOU have to get close to PaulKemp to see his tattoo, but ifyou look hard a small dot is vis-ible at the top of his head. Notquite in the “I LoveMum” cate-gory, instead it marks thepoint where Kemp was inject-ed with his own hair cellstaken from his head andmulti-plied in the laboratory.

The hope was that theywould grow into new folliclesand replenish his thinninglocks. It is hard to tell from acasual look as Kemp’s pate,but he is adamant that thetreatment works and newhairs had appeared. A singleexperiment is evidence of verylittle which is why Intercytex,the company formed by PaulKemp, is conducting clinicaltrials to test its effectiveness.

Preliminary results arelooking interesting. The volun-teers have had new hairgrowth that has remained forup to six years. It is clearly go-ing to take time to know whe-

ther the hairs will last a life-time or whether repeat treat-ments will be required.

There are also interestingquestions to be answeredabout how to administer thetreatment. So far tiny drops ofcell suspension have been in-jected in a fine mosaic from aspecially developed microsy-ringe. This is a laborious pro-cess, although Intercytex isworking on developing a robotto do the injecting.

There is another intriguingpossibility. It might be that,once injected, the cells canmake their own way to dam-aged or dormant follicles andspring them back to life. Thiswould make the injection pro-cess much quicker.

The principle behind thetreatment is straightforward.A few hair follicles are re-moved from a patient’s head.The cells responsible for pro-ducing hairs are isolated,grown and multiplied in the

laboratory and then injectedback into the scalp. The prac-tice is, of course, more chal-lenging. Cells are fragile andkeeping them healthy requiresexpertise, which Kemp hasbeen developing over the pasttwo decades and is exploitingat Intercytex.

The company’s hair regen-eration technology, ICX-TRC,is perhaps its most eye-catch-ing development. Intercytexhas three other products in thepipeline, all based on growinghuman cells in the laboratory— skin replacement, facial re-juvenation and wound repair.The last is in phase three trials,the final stage before applyingfor a licence to market.

Nick Higgins, chief execu-tive at Intercytex (Kemp ischief scientific officer), de-scribes, almost wistfully, howconventional pharmaceuticalscan be stored for a couple ofyears or so. However, the liv-ing cells that are Intercytex’s

speciality have a shelf life ofjust three weeks. As a result,Higgins says, the business com-pares better with sandwich-making than drug manufac-ture. The cells have to be pre-pared fresh and then shippedunder exacting conditions tothe customers. If they are notused within time, they have tobe discarded.

It is here that Intercytex’sdecision to base its manufac-turing plant in Manchestercomes into its own. Proximityto the airport and experiencedlocal shipping agents meansIntercytex can be confidentthat its delicate progeny willmake it safely to its customers.

Being in Manchester hasother benefits too. Aside fromthe city’s thriving university,the North West has a traditionof excellence in biotechnologyso there is no problem recruit-ing skilled staff, and keepingthem is helped by being situat-ed in a lively city.

IT MAY come a surprise tomany that diseases of the circu-lation are the leading cause ofdeath in the UK. One of themore radical ways of treatingthese kinds of diseases is to usesynthetic material as a scaffoldand seed this structure withcells to grow new arteries, Sanj-ida O’Connell writes.

This is one of the areas ofresearch being undertaken bythe UK Centre for Tissue Engi-neering in Liverpool.

The centre was set up as acollaborative venture betweenLiverpool andManchester uni-versities. “We had complimen-tary expertise,” says DavidWil-liams, the centre’s director, “sowe put in a bid together sevenyears ago to collaborate on aninterdisciplinary approach totissue engineering.”

The original grant to fundthe venture runs out this sum-

mer, but Williams is confidentthat the centre will continue toexpand. One of the most excit-ing areas of development sincethe centre’s inception, the pro-fessor says, has been in thearea of cartilage growth.

Currently if the disc in thespinal cord degenerates, onesolution is to fuse neighbour-ing vertebrae together. Now ateam at the centre has madeconsiderable progress in grow-ing cartilage to replace the discusing the patient’s own cells.

“We don't work from em-bryonic stem cells,” says Wil-liams, “We work with adultstem cells either from bonemarrow or blood or fatty tis-sue. Much of our research hasbeen trying to persuade theseadult stem cells to differentiateinto the type of tissue we’ve

been looking for; for instance,by differentiating into the kindof cells that produce cartilage.We haven’t cracked it, but wehave made a lot of progress.”

Other research at thecentre that has progressed dra-matically is in the field of tis-sue engineering of skin, led byMark Ferguson, a professor atManchester. Each year peopleundergo surgery that leads toscarring. The Manchesterteam has been looking at howage, sex and disease can affectwound healing as well as devel-oping good skin grafts.

Collaboration is what hasmade the centre so successful:Williams has spent almost 40years designing materials formedical applications such as re-placement hip joints and heartvalves, but he works alongsidemechanical engineers, bio-chemists, cell biologists and ge-neticists. “This is a really excit-ing area,” he says. “New re-search is published almostevery day and we’re constantlyachieving major developmentsin our ability to treat disease.

“We’re very limited interms of what we can achieveusing synthetic materials,”says Williams.

“What we really need to dois to extend the science so thatwe can regenerate tissue ratherthan replace them with syn-thetic structures. For instance,we’re very good at replacinghips and knees with syntheticmaterials, but you can’t use syn-thetic material to replace nervetissue in the spine or brain, soin neuro-degenerative dis-eases, we can’t do much.

“But what we can now startto offer is a combination ofcells, materials and a variety ofbiomolecules, such as growthfactors, in combination withgene therapy to allow degener-ated nerve to regenerate. Andthat’s the real goal — to recon-struct the body where we haveno current therapies.”

BARRY GREENWOOD

Toby Murcott meets a man taking action on his thinning locks

Straightforward idea toresolve age-old problem

BABIES in the womb do notscar. For Mark Ferguson,chief executive of Renovo,this is a crucial observation.

Unborn babies are grow-ing all the time yet theyemerge blemish free ratherthan covered in stretchmarks, he says. Working outjust what is going on whenscars are formed, or not as inunborn babies, and how toprevent them is Ferguson’slife’s work. It is also the majorbusiness of Renovo, the bio-technology company he co-founded with Sharon O’Kane.

Scars can prevent nervesfrom repairing themselvesproperly after an accident re-sulting in loss of control or

sensation. Scars can also formover joints and prevent themmoving properly. And for thepeople who are prone to aparticular type of scar calledkeloid, skin damage can leadto large growths — scarringout of control. Scarring has ahuge psychological impact.

Ferguson points out thatpeople have a strong reactionto scars. A man with facialscars is likely to be seen as athug, for example.

For 20 years Ferguson hasbeen teasing out what hap-pens as a scar forms and devel-oping drugs to minimisethem. Renovo currently hasfour in development, three toreduce scarring and one to im-

prove wound healing. Themost advanced drug, Juvista,has been tested in more than1,500 patients and the resultsare promising. It reduces theappearance of the scar, less-ens reddening and swellingand promotes better pigmen-tation. Now here is the cleverbit — it seems to work for al-most everyone.

As a result Ferguson is aim-ing Juvista at anyone whogoes into hospital. He believesmany people will be preparedto pay around £150 for a one-off injection to reduce the scar-ring. It is easy to see how thiscould catch on with cosmeticsurgery and Ferguson be-lieves that health insurance

schemes will be prepared topay for accident and traumapatients.

Renovo needs highly spe-cialised employees and Man-chester, says Ferguson, is theperfect place. There are majorresearch-based universities inthe area, such as Liverpool,Manchester and Lancaster.

A further advantage of theNorth West for Renovo is thearea’s communications infra-structure. Renovo is an inter-national company that con-ducts clinical trials around theworld and the local air, railand road links allow him andhis staff to get to where theyneed, when they are needed.TOBY MURCOTT

Drug that helps lessen scar damage

Collaborationproving to be asuccess story

‘We haven’tcracked it, butwe have made alot of progress’

Practising what they preach: Nick Higgins, left, and Paul Kemp of Intercytex, who tried its hair-restoring product on himself

Life’s work: Mark Ferguson has made a scarring breakthrough

BARRY GREENWOOD



ASTRAZENECA’S new can-cer research building, allchrome, sandblasted glass andsandstone, is a high-tech con-trast to the history of its site. Itis based in Alderley Park,Cheshire, which was men-tioned in the Domesday bookof 1087. In 1592 it became thefamily seat of the Stanleyfamily.

But where the familyonce strolled in the 400-acrepark, AstraZeneca, the pharma-ceutical group, now has anR&D site with 4,500 staff and afurther 2,500 in the Maccles-field area. Although AlderleyPark carries out research intoinfection, cardiovascular andmetabolic diseases and inflam-matory illness, its real focus isas a research centre for cancer.Sir James Black received the

Nobel prize in 1988 for beta-blockers, an adrenaline recep-tor-blocking drug that is used

to treat heart disease. Dr JohnStageman, vice-president forbiopharmaceuticals at Astra-Zeneca, says Black put thecompany (formerly part ofICI) on the map.“Since then we have devel-

oped a string of world-leading

cancer medicines, includingNolvadex and Arimidex,which have become gold stand-ard treatments for breastcancer.”The company has invested

£500 million in the NorthWest in the past few years, in-

cluding £60 million on theCancer Research Centre and£58million on a Centre for Ad-vanced Lead Discovery wherecompounds to create newmed-icines are identified. The resultof this level of investment isthat of the 4,500 people at Ald-erley Park, 3,500 are scientists,one in ten of whom has a PhD.AstraZeneca is hoping to

create more new and innova-tive medicines by focusing onbiologically-based therapies,as well as conventional drugs.Cancer cells are normal cells

that are out of control, grow-ing, changing and developinginto tumours that then requirenutrients and will rewire thebodies’ blood vessels to feedthem before, at a late stage ofillness, breaking off into cellsthat form tumours elsewhereround the body.One suite of drugs devel-

oped by AstraZeneca focuses

on antibodies, which can workby breaking down this chain ofevents anywhere in the cycle,from inhibiting the cell’s ram-pant growth to preventing newblood vessels from formingthrough to stopping the inva-sion of the body by cancerouscells.Other drugs have been de-

veloped, which focus on signalprocessing, a critical part ofcancer cell division. For in-stance, a new drug, ZD6474,currently still undergoingtrials, blocks two key signal-ling cancer pathways, VEGFand EGF, thus shutting downtumour blood vessel develop-ment and tumour growth.This year the company cele-

brates 50 years in Chesire witha series of events themedaround science and innovationmarking its contributions topatient health.”SANJIDA O’CONNELL

MORE than 50 years of bio-tech history have left theirmark in the North West. Theregion recently set out to be-come as hospitable as possibleto high-tech and biotech com-panies, which is now paying off.One high-tech facility, the

National BiomanufacturingCentre (NBC) at Speke, nearLiverpool, has attracted manysmall companies and start-ups.It opened last year to help sci-entists with bright ideas tomake the transition to newmedicines. “There has beenmuch interest from countriessuch as Canada and Australiathat want to emulate what theUK has done to get a similarservice,” says Dr Derek Elli-son, business development di-rector for Eden Biodesign, thecentre’s operator.For most young companies

funding is the number one hur-

dle to commercial exploitation.Venture capitalists are reluc-tant to invest without proofthat the product works. Ellisonsays: “Small companies face achicken-and-egg situation. In-vestors want data but there isno data without investment.”Now they can apply to theNorth West Regional Develop-ment Agency for grants of up to£68,000 to use Speke’s facilities.The NBC project is the result

of £34 million of public money.A £3 million investment of gov-ernment money helped tospearhead the development.Dr Linda Magee, who leads

Bionow, the North West Re-gional Development Agency’sbiotechnology programme,says: “That the DTI committedat an early stage was pivotalfor the rest of the project.”Eden BioDesign has contribut-ed £2 million to the upkeep.Building work started in

2004 on a 60,000sq ft plot onthe Estuary Commerce Estatenear Liverpool. Its state-of-the-art facilities are designedto tackle many biopharmaceu-tical products from moleculesto whole cells, mammalian, mi-crobial or viral. By last sum-mer the equipment was in-stalled and validated to com-ply with EU and US qualityguidelines for clinical material.The NBC was ready to go.Onyvax Ltd was first to take

advantage of the NBC servicesto pursue a new vaccine totreat ovarian cancer. The Lon-don company, with financialsupport from the Access Fund,approached the centre to growcells for use in its tests.Dr Stephen Ward, head of

process development, says:“The cells that are given to thepatients stimulate their im-mune systems to control thespread of cancer. Companieslike ours need access to special-ist manufacturing services toproduce this material.”At the University of Liver-

pool, Dr Roger Barracloughand collaborator ProfessorPhilip Rudland have identifieda protein that prompts cancercells to spread to other parts ofthe body. This is an importantdiscovery because this proteinmight, in the long-term, provea suitable target for therapy, tohalt the metastatic spread ofbreast tumour cells.Barraclough also foresees

more immediate clinical appli-cations for this key protein. “Itcould become a marker for dis-ease, to allow doctors to diag-nose cancer more accurately.”To study the protein in more

detail, the researchers neededlarge quantities of a specialisedmolecule. He says: We gavethe NBC the biological materi-als it needed and it scaled upthe production.”As conventional antibiotic

drugs lose the fight against in-fections, bioprospectors aretrawling the oceans in searchof useful new compounds. TheBiotech firm Aquapharm,

from Oban, Scotland, is nowdeveloping one of the first ma-rine pharmaceuticals to fightdrug-resistant micro-organ-isms, including the notorioushospital “superbug”.Dr Dorothee Gotz, R&D

manager at Aquapharm, says:“We are running out of antibiot-ic agents for hospital-acquiredpathogens, so the need for newanti-infectives is urgent.” Thebiotech firm harvests antibiot-ic-producing bacteria fromopen waters, marine sediment,seaweed, or by scraping off sur-face slime from rocks.A highly promising marine

antibacterial protein has en-tered development at theNBC. “Eden Biodesign hastaken over the job of growingcells and isolating the enzyme.They are supplying us with bigamounts to test to see if it is aviable product,” says Gotz.Sugar therapeutics could ad-

vance the fight against Alzhe-imer’s disease, says Dr BillPrimrose, chief executive of In-telliHep. With Eden Biode-sign’s strong manufacturing ex-pertise, the Liverpool start-upis tweaking heparin, a blood-thinning sugar, into a new ther-apy for Alzheimer’s disease.

A hothouse of medical researchNWDA

High-tech work: an AstraZeneca researcher at Alderley Park

NWDA

Celebrating 50 years of saving lives

Sciencecampuswill leadthe world

Sugar therapeuticscould advancethe fight againstAlzheimer’s disease

Lisa Melton reports on thefruits of the region’s successfulcampaign to woo biotech firms

Translating bright ideas into new drugs: the North West is a powerhouse of medical research

IF ALL goes to plan, theDaresbury Science andInnovation Campus willbecome the sound stage forfilms that scientists hope willshow the processes of life atwork at very high speed.This heady promise comes

from the Fourth GenerationLight Source or 4GLS. It is anew particle accelerator beingdeveloped at the DaresburyLaboratory, Cheshire. The4GLS promises to provideresearchers with a range ofdifferent lights and ultra-highspeed recording equipmentable to capture 10,000 billionframes a second.Daresbury has been home

to a machine that does thisfor more than 20 years, theSynchrotron RadiationSource. But the light that the4GLS emits will strobe ratherthan be continuous. With astrobe, you can take snapshotsin rapid succession. In this,4GLS is ahead of the world.Peter Weightman, chairman

of the 4GLS steeringcommittee, believes 4GLScould help answer one of life’sbig mysteries, the selfassembly of biologicalmolecules. He believes 4GLSwill be able to record this as ithappens. The technology willhave applications in otherareas such as watching howfuel burns in a jet engine orhow electrons behave in chips.Funding has not beenconfirmed but the projectteam expect to get aprototype up this summerand are hoping this will leadto the investment. But there ismuch more to this scientificenclave than the 4GLS.The Daresbury Science andInnovation Campus has beenset up with funding from theNWDA to turn scientificinnovation into economicwealth. John Leake, generalmanager, insists that it ismore than just anotherscience park. There is theinnovation centre that offersoffice, lab and workshopspace to SMEs and start-ups.Leake and his team providemanagerial support and helpwith funding applications.The Daresbury laboratoryprovides expertise incomputing, electronics andinstrumentation alongside itsresearch. Tip Chip wasfounded by Austen Bradley todevelop novel medicaldiagnostics. He says he couldnot have got off the groundwithout Daresbury’s facilities.Rapiscan Systems has aresearch company, CXR Ltd,that is developing a 3Dscanner for faster, moreaccurate airport baggagescreening. Director Ed Mortonsays that support fromDaresbury is tremendous.TOBY MURCOTT


ASTRAZENECA’S new can-cer research building, allchrome, sandblasted glass andsandstone, is a high-tech con-trast to the history of its site. Itis based in Alderley Park,Cheshire, which was men-tioned in the Domesday bookof 1087. In 1592 it became thefamily seat of the Stanleyfamily.

But where the familyonce strolled in the 400-acrepark, AstraZeneca, the pharma-ceutical group, now has anR&D site with 4,500 staff and afurther 2,500 in the Maccles-field area. Although AlderleyPark carries out research intoinfection, cardiovascular andmetabolic diseases and inflam-matory illness, its real focus isas a research centre for cancer.Sir James Black received the

Nobel prize in 1988 for beta-blockers, an adrenaline recep-tor-blocking drug that is used

to treat heart disease. Dr JohnStageman, vice-president forbiopharmaceuticals at Astra-Zeneca, says Black put thecompany (formerly part ofICI) on the map.“Since then we have devel-

oped a string of world-leading

cancer medicines, includingNolvadex and Arimidex,which have become gold stand-ard treatments for breastcancer.”The company has invested

£500 million in the NorthWest in the past few years, in-

cluding £60 million on theCancer Research Centre and£58million on a Centre for Ad-vanced Lead Discovery wherecompounds to create newmed-icines are identified. The resultof this level of investment isthat of the 4,500 people at Ald-erley Park, 3,500 are scientists,one in ten of whom has a PhD.AstraZeneca is hoping to

create more new and innova-tive medicines by focusing onbiologically-based therapies,as well as conventional drugs.Cancer cells are normal cells

that are out of control, grow-ing, changing and developinginto tumours that then requirenutrients and will rewire thebodies’ blood vessels to feedthem before, at a late stage ofillness, breaking off into cellsthat form tumours elsewhereround the body.One suite of drugs devel-

oped by AstraZeneca focuses

on antibodies, which can workby breaking down this chain ofevents anywhere in the cycle,from inhibiting the cell’s ram-pant growth to preventing newblood vessels from formingthrough to stopping the inva-sion of the body by cancerouscells.Other drugs have been de-

veloped, which focus on signalprocessing, a critical part ofcancer cell division. For in-stance, a new drug, ZD6474,currently still undergoingtrials, blocks two key signal-ling cancer pathways, VEGFand EGF, thus shutting downtumour blood vessel develop-ment and tumour growth.This year the company cele-

brates 50 years in Chesire witha series of events themedaround science and innovationmarking its contributions topatient health.”SANJIDA O’CONNELL

MORE than 50 years of bio-tech history have left theirmark in the North West. Theregion recently set out to be-come as hospitable as possibleto high-tech and biotech com-panies, which is now paying off.One high-tech facility, the

National BiomanufacturingCentre (NBC) at Speke, nearLiverpool, has attracted manysmall companies and start-ups.It opened last year to help sci-entists with bright ideas tomake the transition to newmedicines. “There has beenmuch interest from countriessuch as Canada and Australiathat want to emulate what theUK has done to get a similarservice,” says Dr Derek Elli-son, business development di-rector for Eden Biodesign, thecentre’s operator.For most young companies

funding is the number one hur-

dle to commercial exploitation.Venture capitalists are reluc-tant to invest without proofthat the product works. Ellisonsays: “Small companies face achicken-and-egg situation. In-vestors want data but there isno data without investment.”Now they can apply to theNorth West Regional Develop-ment Agency for grants of up to£68,000 to use Speke’s facilities.The NBC project is the result

of £34 million of public money.A £3 million investment of gov-ernment money helped tospearhead the development.Dr Linda Magee, who leads

Bionow, the North West Re-gional Development Agency’sbiotechnology programme,says: “That the DTI committedat an early stage was pivotalfor the rest of the project.”Eden BioDesign has contribut-ed £2 million to the upkeep.Building work started in

2004 on a 60,000sq ft plot onthe Estuary Commerce Estatenear Liverpool. Its state-of-the-art facilities are designedto tackle many biopharmaceu-tical products from moleculesto whole cells, mammalian, mi-crobial or viral. By last sum-mer the equipment was in-stalled and validated to com-ply with EU and US qualityguidelines for clinical material.The NBC was ready to go.Onyvax Ltd was first to take

advantage of the NBC servicesto pursue a new vaccine totreat ovarian cancer. The Lon-don company, with financialsupport from the Access Fund,approached the centre to growcells for use in its tests.Dr Stephen Ward, head of

process development, says:“The cells that are given to thepatients stimulate their im-mune systems to control thespread of cancer. Companieslike ours need access to special-ist manufacturing services toproduce this material.”At the University of Liver-

pool, Dr Roger Barracloughand collaborator ProfessorPhilip Rudland have identifieda protein that prompts cancercells to spread to other parts ofthe body. This is an importantdiscovery because this proteinmight, in the long-term, provea suitable target for therapy, tohalt the metastatic spread ofbreast tumour cells.Barraclough also foresees

more immediate clinical appli-cations for this key protein. “Itcould become a marker for dis-ease, to allow doctors to diag-nose cancer more accurately.”To study the protein in more

detail, the researchers neededlarge quantities of a specialisedmolecule. He says: We gavethe NBC the biological materi-als it needed and it scaled upthe production.”As conventional antibiotic

drugs lose the fight against in-fections, bioprospectors aretrawling the oceans in searchof useful new compounds. TheBiotech firm Aquapharm,

from Oban, Scotland, is nowdeveloping one of the first ma-rine pharmaceuticals to fightdrug-resistant micro-organ-isms, including the notorioushospital “superbug”.Dr Dorothee Gotz, R&D

manager at Aquapharm, says:“We are running out of antibiot-ic agents for hospital-acquiredpathogens, so the need for newanti-infectives is urgent.” Thebiotech firm harvests antibiot-ic-producing bacteria fromopen waters, marine sediment,seaweed, or by scraping off sur-face slime from rocks.A highly promising marine

antibacterial protein has en-tered development at theNBC. “Eden Biodesign hastaken over the job of growingcells and isolating the enzyme.They are supplying us with bigamounts to test to see if it is aviable product,” says Gotz.Sugar therapeutics could ad-

vance the fight against Alzhe-imer’s disease, says Dr BillPrimrose, chief executive of In-telliHep. With Eden Biode-sign’s strong manufacturing ex-pertise, the Liverpool start-upis tweaking heparin, a blood-thinning sugar, into a new ther-apy for Alzheimer’s disease.

A hothouse of medical researchNWDA

High-tech work: an AstraZeneca researcher at Alderley Park

NWDA

Celebrating 50 years of saving lives

Sciencecampuswill leadthe world

Sugar therapeuticscould advancethe fight againstAlzheimer’s disease

Lisa Melton reports on thefruits of the region’s successfulcampaign to woo biotech firms

Translating bright ideas into new drugs: the North West is a powerhouse of medical research

IF ALL goes to plan, theDaresbury Science andInnovation Campus willbecome the sound stage forfilms that scientists hope willshow the processes of life atwork at very high speed.This heady promise comes

from the Fourth GenerationLight Source or 4GLS. It is anew particle accelerator beingdeveloped at the DaresburyLaboratory, Cheshire. The4GLS promises to provideresearchers with a range ofdifferent lights and ultra-highspeed recording equipmentable to capture 10,000 billionframes a second.Daresbury has been home

to a machine that does thisfor more than 20 years, theSynchrotron RadiationSource. But the light that the4GLS emits will strobe ratherthan be continuous. With astrobe, you can take snapshotsin rapid succession. In this,4GLS is ahead of the world.Peter Weightman, chairman

of the 4GLS steeringcommittee, believes 4GLScould help answer one of life’sbig mysteries, the selfassembly of biologicalmolecules. He believes 4GLSwill be able to record this as ithappens. The technology willhave applications in otherareas such as watching howfuel burns in a jet engine orhow electrons behave in chips.Funding has not beenconfirmed but the projectteam expect to get aprototype up this summerand are hoping this will leadto the investment. But there ismuch more to this scientificenclave than the 4GLS.The Daresbury Science andInnovation Campus has beenset up with funding from theNWDA to turn scientificinnovation into economicwealth. John Leake, generalmanager, insists that it ismore than just anotherscience park. There is theinnovation centre that offersoffice, lab and workshopspace to SMEs and start-ups.Leake and his team providemanagerial support and helpwith funding applications.The Daresbury laboratoryprovides expertise incomputing, electronics andinstrumentation alongside itsresearch. Tip Chip wasfounded by Austen Bradley todevelop novel medicaldiagnostics. He says he couldnot have got off the groundwithout Daresbury’s facilities.Rapiscan Systems has aresearch company, CXR Ltd,that is developing a 3Dscanner for faster, moreaccurate airport baggagescreening. Director Ed Mortonsays that support fromDaresbury is tremendous.TOBY MURCOTT



BY HER own admission Nan-cy Rothwell gets bored doingjust one thing — just as well,as she is a leading brain trau-ma researcher, vice-presidentof research at Manchester Uni-versity, a prolific public speak-er, a passionate advocate forscience, a writer and broadcast-er and she sits on numerouscommittees and panels.

Professor Dame Nancy

Rothwell FRS is also a serialcollector of accolades. Shewon the Pfizer award for re-search in 2003, was made adame in 2004 and is a fellow ofthe Academy of Medical Sci-ences. But the one that clearlymatters most was being elect-ed a fellow of the RoyalSociety. Joining this elitegroup is one of the highest rec-ognitions for a scientist — anacknowledgement that yourwork ranks with the very best.

The central thread of her re-search is understanding howbrain cells are damaged in avariety of different diseasesand how to reduce the devasta-tion such damage brings.Strokes, the third highest killerin the West, is top of the list.

Rothwell and her team areputting on trial a drug thatthey hope can lessen the dam-age that a blocked blood vesselin the brain produces. The prin-ciple is deceptively simple.

A chemical called inter-

leukin-1 is released at the trau-ma site as part of the defenceagainst infection. However, italso brings with it an unwant-ed side-effect — it damagesbrain cells. The drug blocks itsactivity. It is already used forarthritis and preliminary testssuggest that it is safe to use inbrain injury. Rothwell is, how-ever, cautious. There is a longway to go, she says.

Friendly, direct and sharp-witted, Rothwell manages thatrare trick of enjoying her intel-lect without putting anyonedown. This goes some way per-haps to explaining her successas a shaper of scientific re-search. She looks after all ofthe research undertaken at theUniversity of Manchester —all of it, in every discipline.

She believes that the basicsof research are the same as formusic, maths andmolecular bi-ology — employ creative re-searchers and support them.She also suspects her A level inart helps to span disciplines,giving her an inkling of the ar-tistic creative process.

Her public image has beenboth raised and coloured byher preparedness to speak outon animal research. It arosefrom her honesty about, andpassion for, science. Whetherpeople like it or not she says,she makes it very clear thatshe would rather not conductanimal research, but animalsare important in research, par-ticularly on human diseases.

Perhaps disappointingly,Rothwell has no clear formulafor success in research. Herown career was not mappedout. After A levels she had to

choose between art, maths andbiology at university. She re-jected art on the basis that shewas not good enough to makea living out of it and maths wastoo boring. Her choice of uni-versity was based on its prox-imity to London’s KensingtonHigh Street, an exciting placeto be in the seventies. A doctor-ate followed her first class de-gree and then she was award-ed a Royal Society fellowship.

This award allowed Roth-well to return to her roots inthe North and she is thrilledby Manchester’s transforma-tion over the past 20 years.

Rothwell liaises with manylocal businesses and organisa-tions and unprompted singsthe praises of the North WestRegional Development Agen-

cy, a body she says has beenhugely supportive of the uni-versity's research agenda. It ishard to get a clear picture ofhow the young researcher ma-tured into the respected poly-math. Ability and her desire toseek new challenges play apart. Passion, too, has a keyrole. Treating a researchcareer like another job justdoes not work, she says.

Bombarded by requests tovisit schools, she gives priorityto those from disadvantagedareas. “If just one pupil nowthinks about science as acareer, that will be a success.”

Polymath seeks tolimit brain damageToby Murcott profiles a Manchester dame wholeft London’s bright lights to return to her roots

She says the basicsof biology researchare the same as formusic and maths

HOWARD WALKER

Passion has a keyrole. Treating aresearch career likea job does not work

Pondering brain damage from Alzheimer’s: Nancy Rothwell is working on a new drug thatit is hoped will lessen the damage that is produced by a blocked blood vessel in the brain



THE North West is launchinga new era with mediacity:uk, abold development in Salfordthat will change the face of themedia and creative sector.

The BBC is expected to bethe anchor tenant for the ven-ture and will be key to attract-ing a broad range of other crea-tive and media firms into thedevelopment that will offer res-idents everything they want ina residential area includingschools, a walk-in NHS facilityand a variety of entertain-ments. The corporation aimsto take up residence by 2011.

Mediacity:uk will be uniquein Britain — the first city of anew breed: “They are a newphenomenon,” says FelicityGoodey, chief executive of me-diacity:uk. “What they have incommon is that they are majordevelopments that attract and

retain creative people. “Theyare not business parks orscience parks. They are placeswhere people live work,research, learn and play, andare major visitor destinationsin themselves.”

For the BBC, which is plan-ning to move a number ofdepartments to Salford, it willbe a sea change representing anew approach to the way thecorporation works and anopportunity to maintain itsposition and enhance its statusin terms of the global digitalrevolution. Furthermore theBBC aims to achieve all thismore cheaply than it doesnow. “This is a huge departurefrom anything that they havedone in the past,” says Goodey.

“At the BBC they’re nowsaying how can we benefitfrom this major transforma-

tional development,” says Bry-an Gray, chairman of theNorthWest Regional Develop-ment Agency. “They them-selves want to use the opportu-nity to transform the way theywork and the relationship with

their suppliers and content pro-viders.” A whole range of me-dia industries, he says, nowwant to move to the region tobase themselves close to thecorporation. “The BBC’s viewis this project has started now.It starts today as we start plan-ning for the cultural and tech-nical changes that mediacity al-lows us to embrace.”

The corporation will moveinto a new, purpose-built build-ing offering a chance to breakaway from the 1920-30s DNAof Television Centre in WhiteCity with its circumscribed pat-tern of self-contained offices.One BBC executive noted thata building can shape the wayan organisation operates andthis had become the case withthe way the corporation func-tioned on the White City site.

“It is commercially as wellas creatively compelling,” saysanother BBC executive, as thecorporation will merely rentspace and bear no financialburden in the construction,which will be undertaken byPeel Holdings.

The initial investment forphase one of mediacity will be£350 million, excluding thecost of the land. Overseeingthe project will be an experi-enced team that was involvedin the redevelopment of Lon-don’s Docklands and Liver-pool’s Albert Dock.

For Greater Manchesterthe BBC is the juicy wormwith which they hope to at-tract numerous other news,media and creative organisa-tions hoping to benefit fromthe presence and the synergiesof such a key generator of con-tract work and opportunities.

It is hoped that at least five

local radio stations will take upspace in the building alongwith digital and video artsfirms, computer software com-panies and other companies.They will be able to take advan-tage of a state-of-the-art stu-dio block and other facilitiesthat are currently nowhereavailable in such a focused andconcentrated form. There arehopes for the provision ofmore than 15,000 jobs whenthe city is fully developed.

Among the concerns look-ing at the prospect of takingup tenancies in this brave newworld is the University of Sal-ford, which has the largest arts

and media faculty in the coun-try. The university was alreadyembarking on plans for a £60million new facility on a sitethat it had just acquired whenthe opportunity to becomepart of mediacity:uk arose.

If negotiations for the uni-versity to take space aresuccessful, Salford will bringmore than 4,000 students onsite. The local council, mean-while, is moving ahead withplans to complement the uni-versity’s presence with a spe-cialist media academy.

Another centre of expertisewill most probably be a virtualtraining institute and researchand development centre, bothof which will play a role in link-ing universities and other cen-tres of excellence across thenorth of England.

But mediacity:uk’s plannersand developers emphasise thatthe new development has alsoto play a strong role as acentre of entertainment, notonly for those who live in theregion, but also for visitors.

So the newest star in theGreaterManchester city firma-ment will have a central piazzathat will be twice the size ofTrafalgar Square and will aimto attract millions of visitorsannually. It is planned that atleast 30 major events will beheld in the piazza every year.

To ensure that nobody visit-ing mediacity:uk will ever havereason to be bored, all of thepublic areas will have digitalconnections to make theminteractive. There will be hugevideo screens and video wallswired for interaction — “tomake it a fun place,” saysGoodey. “It is very much tar-geted at inviting the public tocome and play.”

So far Greater Manchesterhas other competitors in thisera of new cities — but nopeers. Zaragoza, Copenhagen,Dubai, Singapore and Shang-hai have special new citiesplanned or under way, butnone is wired into the mediafuture in the way of the Salfordproject.

Shanghai’s new city will bebuilt on the shores of the EastChina Sea that will effectivelygive it a new port to comple-ment the great port of Shang-hai — “two ports, one city” asthe Chinese like to put it. InSingapore, the city state is in-vesting in the multi-million-pound Biopolis project, a newmedical city that is designed toput Singapore in the front rankof world medical research.

Star billingfor BBC ina bravenew world

‘It is very muchtargeted atinviting the publicto come and play’

David Watts looks at the plansto build a new interactive cityon the outskirts of Manchester

Manchesterjoins Dubai,Copenhagen,Singapore,Zaragoza andShanghai bycreating newcities ontheirdoorsteps

This is thefuture formany BBCemployees —an artist’simpressionof thecorporation’snew offices

www.investinenglandsnorthwest.com8 NORTH WEST ENGLAND THE TIMES 19 M

THE North West is launchinga new era with mediacity:uk, abold development in Salfordthat will change the face of themedia and creative sector.

The BBC is expected to bethe anchor tenant for the ven-ture and will be key to attract-ing a broad range of other crea-tive and media firms into thedevelopment that will offer res-idents everything they want ina residential area includingschools, a walk-in NHS facilityand a variety of entertain-ments. The corporation aimsto take up residence by 2011.

Mediacity:uk will be uniquein Britain — the first city of anew breed: “They are a newphenomenon,” says FelicityGoodey, chief executive of me-diacity:uk. “What they have incommon is that they are majordevelopments that attract and

retain creative people. “Theyare not business parks orscience parks. They are placeswhere people live work,research, learn and play, andare major visitor destinationsin themselves.”

For the BBC, which is plan-ning to move a number ofdepartments to Salford, it willbe a sea change representing anew approach to the way thecorporation works and anopportunity to maintain itsposition and enhance its statusin terms of the global digitalrevolution. Furthermore theBBC aims to achieve all thismore cheaply than it doesnow. “This is a huge departurefrom anything that they havedone in the past,” says Goodey.

“At the BBC they’re nowsaying how can we benefitfrom this major transforma-

tional development,” says Bry-an Gray, chairman of theNorthWest Regional Develop-ment Agency. “They them-selves want to use the opportu-nity to transform the way theywork and the relationship with

their suppliers and content pro-viders.” A whole range of me-dia industries, he says, nowwant to move to the region tobase themselves close to thecorporation. “The BBC’s viewis this project has started now.It starts today as we start plan-ning for the cultural and tech-nical changes that mediacity al-lows us to embrace.”

The corporation will moveinto a new, purpose-built build-ing offering a chance to breakaway from the 1920-30s DNAof Television Centre in WhiteCity with its circumscribed pat-tern of self-contained offices.One BBC executive noted thata building can shape the wayan organisation operates andthis had become the case withthe way the corporation func-tioned on the White City site.

“It is commercially as wellas creatively compelling,” saysanother BBC executive, as thecorporation will merely rentspace and bear no financialburden in the construction,which will be undertaken byPeel Holdings.

The initial investment forphase one of mediacity will be£350 million, excluding thecost of the land. Overseeingthe project will be an experi-enced team that was involvedin the redevelopment of Lon-don’s Docklands and Liver-pool’s Albert Dock.

For Greater Manchesterthe BBC is the juicy wormwith which they hope to at-tract numerous other news,media and creative organisa-tions hoping to benefit fromthe presence and the synergiesof such a key generator of con-tract work and opportunities.

It is hoped that at least five

local radio stations will take upspace in the building alongwith digital and video artsfirms, computer software com-panies and other companies.They will be able to take advan-tage of a state-of-the-art stu-dio block and other facilitiesthat are currently nowhereavailable in such a focused andconcentrated form. There arehopes for the provision ofmore than 15,000 jobs whenthe city is fully developed.

Among the concerns look-ing at the prospect of takingup tenancies in this brave newworld is the University of Sal-ford, which has the largest arts

and media faculty in the coun-try. The university was alreadyembarking on plans for a £60million new facility on a sitethat it had just acquired whenthe opportunity to becomepart of mediacity:uk arose.

If negotiations for the uni-versity to take space aresuccessful, Salford will bringmore than 4,000 students onsite. The local council, mean-while, is moving ahead withplans to complement the uni-versity’s presence with a spe-cialist media academy.

Another centre of expertisewill most probably be a virtualtraining institute and researchand development centre, bothof which will play a role in link-ing universities and other cen-tres of excellence across thenorth of England.

But mediacity:uk’s plannersand developers emphasise thatthe new development has alsoto play a strong role as acentre of entertainment, notonly for those who live in theregion, but also for visitors.

So the newest star in theGreaterManchester city firma-ment will have a central piazzathat will be twice the size ofTrafalgar Square and will aimto attract millions of visitorsannually. It is planned that atleast 30 major events will beheld in the piazza every year.

To ensure that nobody visit-ing mediacity:uk will ever havereason to be bored, all of thepublic areas will have digitalconnections to make theminteractive. There will be hugevideo screens and video wallswired for interaction — “tomake it a fun place,” saysGoodey. “It is very much tar-geted at inviting the public tocome and play.”

So far Greater Manchesterhas other competitors in thisera of new cities — but nopeers. Zaragoza, Copenhagen,Dubai, Singapore and Shang-hai have special new citiesplanned or under way, butnone is wired into the mediafuture in the way of the Salfordproject.

Shanghai’s new city will bebuilt on the shores of the EastChina Sea that will effectivelygive it a new port to comple-ment the great port of Shang-hai — “two ports, one city” asthe Chinese like to put it. InSingapore, the city state is in-vesting in the multi-million-pound Biopolis project, a newmedical city that is designed toput Singapore in the front rankof world medical research.

Star billingfor BBC ina bravenew world

‘It is very muchtargeted atinviting the publicto come and play’

David Watts looks at the plansto build a new interactive cityon the outskirts of Manchester

Manchesterjoins Dubai,Copenhagen,Singapore,Zaragoza andShanghai bycreating newcities ontheirdoorsteps

This is thefuture formany BBCemployees —an artist’simpressionof thecorporation’snew offices

www.investinenglandsnorthwest.com8 NORTH WEST ENGLAND THE TIMES 19


THE hugely successful launchof Sony’s PlayStation3 gam-ing console in America andJapan was based solidly in theNorth West.

The region’s softwareskills created the two games— F1 Championship EditionandMotorStorm—which be-came instant hits poweringthe new gamesmachine to glo-bal acclaim and boosting ex-pectations of the launch ofPS3 in Britain on Friday.

Michael Denny, vice-presi-dent, Sony Computer Enter-tainment Europe, based in Liv-erpool is delighted with thecompany’s 12-year record ofachievement: “In terms of theworldwide industry we havesome really market-leadingcompanies and between us weproduce the finest video-games ever made.”

The company developssome games in-house, as withF1, and contracts others out tolocal companies clusteredalong Silicon Canal, theNorthWest’s equivalent of Sil-icon Valley.

Denny seeks a balancebetween inside and outsideproductions. Sometimes exter-nally created games are moreexperimental, he says, andthat, as in other creative indus-tries, the really imaginativepersonalities like to run theirown companies. Among localstudios working with Sony areEvolution Studios, Bizarre Cre-ations and Travellers’ Tales.

Sony Europe also hasresponsiblity for quality con-trol of the company’s gamesworldwide and the plant isusually busy 24 hours a daywith up to 300 people asyoung gamers test Sony’sproducts in search of glitches.“We want them to play thegames and do things to themthat would not normally be

done to see if they crash,” saysDenny. For anybody wantingto become a games expert,this is a good place to start.“They can get experience asthey learn how the games aremade and may be get into pro-duction and the actual crea-tion of the games.

“We’re talent hungry,”Denny says as he expands onthe new horizons opening uparound gaming and the rapid-ly expanding concepts of com-munity online gaming, whichhe feels will attract people, es-pecially women, who feel thatgaming is not for them.

“We used to have veryshort sales cycles in which agame would sell all it was go-ing to sell in six months,” headds. Now the picture is verydifferent. “The future of vid-eo-gaming is about the net-work and building communi-ties. The disc will be the startof a business, the start of a ser-

vice that we have to monitorand provide new content regu-larly online. We feel that theonline, digital supply ofgames and content and play-ing is absolutely the future.”

Denny welcomes theopportunities to tap into newlines of talent that will comewith the full development ofGreaterManchester’s mediaci-ty:uk. It will help Sony tomove in the direction it needsto go with the higher qualityimaging available throughhigh definition televisionmov-ing gaming closer to cinemat-ic quality.DAVID WATTS

AT A recent programme plan-ning meeting in London aquestioner asked a Channel4 executive how many pro-duction companies werepitching genuine new mediacontent to the network.

There were only three, twoin London and one from Mer-seyside — Lime Pictures,whose chief executive, Caro-lyn Reynolds, is one of thekey members of the Mersey-side showbiz aristocracy. HerCV reveals a long association

with Coronation Street. Rey-nolds wrily notes that despitethe drive to get the BBC toput more money into televi-sion programmes made inthe regions, she is only nowabout to land a significantnew commission — two yearson from the initial pitch to thecorporation. “It’s a long, slowprocess but at least we havekick-started it.”

Lime Pictures was found-ed by Phil Redmond to makeBrookside for Channel 4 and

production continued for 21years. Hollyoaks began in1995, initially airing just oncea week but working its way upto five episodes a week from2003. Lime’s contract to pro-duce Grange Hill for the BBCruns through to its 30th anni-versary next year.

The drive for new mediacontent is spreaheaded bythe company’s Conker Mediadivision, which is targetingcable and regional clients.DAVID WATTS

Silicon Canal takespride of place inPlayStation success

‘We want them toplay the gamesand do things tosee if they crash’

PATIENCE PAYS DIVIDENDS FOR MERSEYSIDE’S LIME PICTURES

Reynolds: “slow process”

www.investinenglandsnorthwest.com19 MARCH 2007 1GX NORTH WEST ENGLAND 919


THERE is a caravan park inCumbria with a secret — it hasa hidden power station as aneighbour. The small hydro-electric power station in Glen-ridding produces enough elec-tricity to power 300 homes.

Controlled remotely fromManchester the station simplysits there, virtually silent in aconverted barn, extracting

carbon free electricity fromthe rain-soaked hillside.

Cumbria and the Lake Dis-trict could have been made forhydropower. High rainfall onsteep slopes provides fast-flow-ing water able to turn a vastnumber of turbines — butthere is a problem. Installinghydroelectric schemes acrossthe Lake District makes sensefrom a clean energy perspec-tive, but it would turn thenational park into an eyesorein the eyes of many.

This conflict between theneed to reduce fossil fuel con-sumption and the preservation

of the environment dominatesrenewable energy debates.And that is before economics,reliability, sustainability, plan-ning implications and techno-logical know-how are takeninto account.

George Aggidis, professorof engineering at LancasterUniversity, is hoping to easethe controversy. He is headinga team developing a tool tohelp anyone considering ahydroelectricity scheme.

The idea is to produce awebsite that anyone can visitand enter the details of theirproposed generator. The infor-mation will be processed toproduce a report detailing justwhat needs to be done tomake it viable. The aim, saysAggidis, is to make it useful foreveryone from a farmer hop-ing to exploit a stream to poli-cymakers developing large-scale power generation plans.

The backing for Aggidis’sproject comes from the JouleCentre for Energy Research, apartnership of NorthWest uni-versities, commercial organisa-tions and the Northwest Re-gional Development Agency.

Nick Jenkins, Joule’s direc-tor, says the centre’s funding— £5 million over five years —

is aimed at both energy supplyand conservation.

The first round early lastyear focused on what Jenkinscalls wet projects, hydropower,wave power and such like. Thesecond round concentrated onreducing demand and hasfunded projects such as a math-ematical technique to workout the most efficient ways ofmanaging electricity demandand exploring the best way ofusing low-power alternativesto light bulbs. The third call forfunding is under way with thetheme of energy supply tech-nologies — how to make anddistribute renewable energy.

The North West, saysJenkins, has many natural re-sources to exploit and a con-centration of expertise in the

local universities and indus-tries. The grants awarded bythe Joule Centre represent justa fraction of the research inthe region.

There are studies underway into tidal power in the

Mersey estuary, offshore windfarms, wave energy and the im-pact of air travel. Jenkins him-self is involved in research intolarge wind turbines and a float-ing wave power device calledthe Manchester Bobber.

Aggidis’s group, mean-

while, is developing the PSFrog, an intriguingly namedalternative wave power device.

There are also ambitiousplans to extract energy fromthe tides. Richard Burrows,professor of environmental hy-draulics at Liverpool, is tryingto work out howmuch electric-ity tidal power can be har-nessed in the eastern Irish Sea.

The most controversial tid-al power schemes are knownas the barrages — huge damsthat fill up with water at hightide and then release waterthrough turbines as the tideebbs away. They are, says Bur-rows, probably the most effi-cient method of capturing tid-al energy but they also havebig environmental impacts.

The most common concern

is that they will damage impor-tant habitat, particularly birds.But tidal barrages could alsoprotect coasts from some ofthe effects of global warmingby acting as flood barriers.They could also provide addi-tional crossings with roads run-ning along the top. Burrows isalso exploring alternatives tobarrages, such as placing tur-bines on the seabed where tid-al currents are fast.

Burrows says tidal powerhas the potential to producebetween 15 and 20 per cent ofthe UK’s electricity. Couplethis with hydro, wind andwave power and these technol-ogies have the potential tomake a significant dent in Brit-ain’s reliance on fossil fuels.1www.joulecentre.org

WHENNeil and Tiffany Hen-ry told friends that they weremoving from Henley to Man-chester the attitude was “whyon earth would you want togo there?” They admit to har-bouring a few preconceptionsof their own as they relocatedwith two young children toStyal, Cheshire. Six yearslater, they would not return.Neil, 43, has built a market-

ing company specialising inthe retail and financial sectorsand has put exhausting dayscommuting between Oxford-shire and London behind him.The family has thrived in therolling Cheshire countryside.They moved to a semi-rural

suburb renowned for QuarryBank Mill, a 19th-century millwhere apprentices workedfrom dawn to dusk at theirlooms and, on their one day ofrest, were marched to chapel.

These days the mill is a visitorattraction at the centre of aNational Trust country park.Tiffany, 40, said: “I was

quite nervous about comingup north to Manchester. I didnot know a soul. Now, it is dif-ficult to remember that time.After six years we call ithome. We have established awide circle of friends. “WhenI arrived with two small child-ren I found people approach-able and happy to talk. Evenat the checkout at Tescopeople strike up a conversa-tion. I was not used to it buthave come to appreciate it”.The move north came

about when Neil became agroup marketing director inWilmslow. A year later hejudged it was right to go italone. He says: “When we de-cided to set up a business ayear after we arrived, it was

driven by the desire to stayhere. Within a year we hadgone from not being tied tothis part of the world to want-ing most definitely to stay.”Neil and a partner set up

Linchpin Marketing in 2001.The business, which employsseven people, is an affinitymarketing agency brokeringdeals between organisations.He adds: “This is a good

place to be. We are not a localor regional marketing agency.Our clients are national organ-isations just as likely to be inBournemouth, South Walesor Cambridge as in London.“It has never cropped up

with a client that they are inthe South and we are in theNorth. Meeting a client face toface is less important. A lot ofwork can be done via e-mailor conference calls.”RUSSELL JENKINS

One happy family says ‘it’s great up North’

Living in Styal: Neil and Tiffany with children Jake and Jessica soon decided they would stay for good

MARK SUMNER/MERCURY PRESS

The North Westhas many naturalresources andplenty of expertise

The big andsmall ideasto replacefossil fuels

Tidal power has thepotential to provide15-20 per cent ofthe UK’s electricity

The North West is looking atambitious plans for renewableenergy, reports Toby Murcott

Green dilemma: the Lake District’s high rainfall and steep slopes are made for hydropower but the associated plant would be an eyesore

PETER ADAMS/CORBIS


THERE is a caravan park inCumbria with a secret — it hasa hidden power station as aneighbour. The small hydro-electric power station in Glen-ridding produces enough elec-tricity to power 300 homes.

Controlled remotely fromManchester the station simplysits there, virtually silent in aconverted barn, extracting

carbon free electricity fromthe rain-soaked hillside.

Cumbria and the Lake Dis-trict could have been made forhydropower. High rainfall onsteep slopes provides fast-flow-ing water able to turn a vastnumber of turbines — butthere is a problem. Installinghydroelectric schemes acrossthe Lake District makes sensefrom a clean energy perspec-tive, but it would turn thenational park into an eyesorein the eyes of many.

This conflict between theneed to reduce fossil fuel con-sumption and the preservation

of the environment dominatesrenewable energy debates.And that is before economics,reliability, sustainability, plan-ning implications and techno-logical know-how are takeninto account.

George Aggidis, professorof engineering at LancasterUniversity, is hoping to easethe controversy. He is headinga team developing a tool tohelp anyone considering ahydroelectricity scheme.

The idea is to produce awebsite that anyone can visitand enter the details of theirproposed generator. The infor-mation will be processed toproduce a report detailing justwhat needs to be done tomake it viable. The aim, saysAggidis, is to make it useful foreveryone from a farmer hop-ing to exploit a stream to poli-cymakers developing large-scale power generation plans.

The backing for Aggidis’sproject comes from the JouleCentre for Energy Research, apartnership of NorthWest uni-versities, commercial organisa-tions and the Northwest Re-gional Development Agency.

Nick Jenkins, Joule’s direc-tor, says the centre’s funding— £5 million over five years —

is aimed at both energy supplyand conservation.

The first round early lastyear focused on what Jenkinscalls wet projects, hydropower,wave power and such like. Thesecond round concentrated onreducing demand and hasfunded projects such as a math-ematical technique to workout the most efficient ways ofmanaging electricity demandand exploring the best way ofusing low-power alternativesto light bulbs. The third call forfunding is under way with thetheme of energy supply tech-nologies — how to make anddistribute renewable energy.

The North West, saysJenkins, has many natural re-sources to exploit and a con-centration of expertise in the

local universities and indus-tries. The grants awarded bythe Joule Centre represent justa fraction of the research inthe region.

There are studies underway into tidal power in the

Mersey estuary, offshore windfarms, wave energy and the im-pact of air travel. Jenkins him-self is involved in research intolarge wind turbines and a float-ing wave power device calledthe Manchester Bobber.

Aggidis’s group, mean-

while, is developing the PSFrog, an intriguingly namedalternative wave power device.

There are also ambitiousplans to extract energy fromthe tides. Richard Burrows,professor of environmental hy-draulics at Liverpool, is tryingto work out howmuch electric-ity tidal power can be har-nessed in the eastern Irish Sea.

The most controversial tid-al power schemes are knownas the barrages — huge damsthat fill up with water at hightide and then release waterthrough turbines as the tideebbs away. They are, says Bur-rows, probably the most effi-cient method of capturing tid-al energy but they also havebig environmental impacts.

The most common concern

is that they will damage impor-tant habitat, particularly birds.But tidal barrages could alsoprotect coasts from some ofthe effects of global warmingby acting as flood barriers.They could also provide addi-tional crossings with roads run-ning along the top. Burrows isalso exploring alternatives tobarrages, such as placing tur-bines on the seabed where tid-al currents are fast.

Burrows says tidal powerhas the potential to producebetween 15 and 20 per cent ofthe UK’s electricity. Couplethis with hydro, wind andwave power and these technol-ogies have the potential tomake a significant dent in Brit-ain’s reliance on fossil fuels.1www.joulecentre.org

WHENNeil and Tiffany Hen-ry told friends that they weremoving from Henley to Man-chester the attitude was “whyon earth would you want togo there?” They admit to har-bouring a few preconceptionsof their own as they relocatedwith two young children toStyal, Cheshire. Six yearslater, they would not return.Neil, 43, has built a market-

ing company specialising inthe retail and financial sectorsand has put exhausting dayscommuting between Oxford-shire and London behind him.The family has thrived in therolling Cheshire countryside.They moved to a semi-rural

suburb renowned for QuarryBank Mill, a 19th-century millwhere apprentices workedfrom dawn to dusk at theirlooms and, on their one day ofrest, were marched to chapel.

These days the mill is a visitorattraction at the centre of aNational Trust country park.Tiffany, 40, said: “I was

quite nervous about comingup north to Manchester. I didnot know a soul. Now, it is dif-ficult to remember that time.After six years we call ithome. We have established awide circle of friends. “WhenI arrived with two small child-ren I found people approach-able and happy to talk. Evenat the checkout at Tescopeople strike up a conversa-tion. I was not used to it buthave come to appreciate it”.The move north came

about when Neil became agroup marketing director inWilmslow. A year later hejudged it was right to go italone. He says: “When we de-cided to set up a business ayear after we arrived, it was

driven by the desire to stayhere. Within a year we hadgone from not being tied tothis part of the world to want-ing most definitely to stay.”Neil and a partner set up

Linchpin Marketing in 2001.The business, which employsseven people, is an affinitymarketing agency brokeringdeals between organisations.He adds: “This is a good

place to be. We are not a localor regional marketing agency.Our clients are national organ-isations just as likely to be inBournemouth, South Walesor Cambridge as in London.“It has never cropped up

with a client that they are inthe South and we are in theNorth. Meeting a client face toface is less important. A lot ofwork can be done via e-mailor conference calls.”RUSSELL JENKINS

One happy family says ‘it’s great up North’

Living in Styal: Neil and Tiffany with children Jake and Jessica soon decided they would stay for good

MARK SUMNER/MERCURY PRESS

The North Westhas many naturalresources andplenty of expertise

The big andsmall ideasto replacefossil fuels

Tidal power has thepotential to provide15-20 per cent ofthe UK’s electricity

The North West is looking atambitious plans for renewableenergy, reports Toby Murcott

Green dilemma: the Lake District’s high rainfall and steep slopes are made for hydropower but the associated plant would be an eyesore

PETER ADAMS/CORBIS



OPENING UP an office fromscratch is not the Bank of NewYork’s usual tactic. The venera-ble institution is better knownfor acquiring teams and offic-es. In September 2005, how-ever, the bank opened for busi-ness on Manchester’s Piccadil-ly Gardens.

TheManchester office han-dles specialist financial ser-vices for global clients and spe-cialises in securities servicing— the settlement and manage-ment of equity investmentportfolios for pension funds, in-surance companies and invest-ment funds. Jackie Williams,head of operations, says thatfor this critical and high-valueline of business, the bankwanted to put its stamp on anew group of people. “We tookthe opportunity to lookaround. And Manchestercame up as a clear favourite.”

Today the Manchesteroperation has 430 staff, upfrom 120 when it opened, andWilliams aims to reach 730 bythe end of this year. She saysthe bank has been delightedwith high-calibre local candi-dates. With four universitieswithin easy reach, the bankhas the pick of “literally hun-dreds of graduates in the kindof degree subjects we’re inter-ested in,” Williams says.

For Manchester, the arrivalof the Bank of New York is sig-nificant. While the city alreadyhad a good spread of estab-lished banks — some 60 play-ers — none were providing se-curities servicing, so the movehelped create a sense that the

region could provide morethan just the bedrock of main-stream banking and financialactivity. The bank has re-inforced that impression. Its re-cruitment drive this year is allabout setting up another nicheoperation to handle fundaccounting and reporting forasset managers.

These specialist servicescomplement Manchester’s al-ready thriving business bank-ing sector. Royal Bank of Scot-land (RBS), for instance, pro-vides banking services formany of the FTSE 250 compa-nies that have headquarters inthe North West. Richard Top-liss, an RBS executive, says thebank prides itself on being ableto support any client wantingto access asset, debt, equity orsyndicated finance out of Man-chester, without recourse toLondon expertise. “The regionhas ever increasing self confi-dence,” he says. “We have a

great focus on aerospace, foodmanufacturing and indeed fi-nancial services locally.”

Paul Smith, of Bank of Scot-land Corporate, echoes thosesentiments, pointing out thatthe growth of Manchester andLiverpool airports means thatfew international destinations

are out of reach. For overseascompanies with subsidiariesbased in the region, 70 percent of those subsidiaries canfly direct to their parent com-panies, whether in Europe orAmerica. “The NorthWest is avery attractive, buoyant placefor businesses to be based,”Smith says. “The city hasworked very hard over the lastten years to promote the ideathat we have the professionalabilities here to service thelarger deals and clients.”

Midas, Manchester’s in-ward investment agency,wants to attract more Amer-ican banks to the region andsays that proof of the city’s vi-brancy as a financial centrelies in the Bank of New York’sgrowth. Certainly Jackie Wil-liams has no qualms about en-dorsing the skills and profes-sionalism that she has found.“We’re developing a realcentre of excellence here.”

Half-price feesprove to be astrong incentiveTWO hours from London bytrain, flights from ManchesterAirport to 190 internationaldestinations and 220,000 pro-fessional and financial staff —the stage is set for Manches-ter’s transformation from in-dustrial to financial heartland.The region’s lawyers, ac-

countants and entrepreneurswith the backing of big finan-cial institutions and private eq-uity houses are promoting hardthe North West’s dealmakingand capital markets expertise.They have some big deals to

point to, notably the sale ofthe Caudwell Group to two pri-vate equity houses for £1.5 bil-lion last year. The deal was bro-kered by Manchester corpo-rate financiers at NM Roth-schild with legal advice fromManchester’s Eversheds office.Eversheds, DLA Piper and

Addleshaws all provide advi-sory work for private equitydeals in Manchester and thecity offers not just expertise,but great value for money,says Daniel Hall, head of cor-porate finance at Eversheds.At £350 per hour, fees are halfthose of London equivalents.That is a persuasive argu-

ment for deals with a value of£100 million-plus. There were28 private equity deals of morethan £100 million involvingNorth West companies lastyear. The total value of dealsthat year was £19.7 billion,against £10.9 billion in 2005.The city also has a thriving

AIM advisory community, in-cluding the only group of AIMNomads — nominated advis-ers — outside London. FrankShephard, partner in Halli-wells corporate finance divi-sion, says: “Not all the regionsraise public equity as well asyou see in Manchester.” PeteClarke of ISIS Equity Part-ners, adds: “There is a realcentre of excellence here.”The Big Four accountants

have a presence in Manches-ter along with national firms,BDO Stoy Hayward, GrantThornton and Baker Tilly, —named AIM Accountant ofthe Year by Growth CompanyInvestor four years running.According to Baker Tilly in-

dependent research, 23 NorthWest companies were admit-ted to AIM in 2006 raising£254 million.LIZ LOXTON

18,590The number of students inGreater Manchester

37,923The number of students atNorth West universities

54,253The number of studentswithin one hour’s driveSource: Midas

Pool of talent

New York sets up shopLiz Loxton onwhy a top USbank hasopened up inManchester

CHUBB Insurance, the UScompany, has a one-stop-shop policy for directors’and officers’ cover,professional indemnity,pension fund liability andbusiness interruption.

Hiscox Insurance,which opened inManchester in January, istargeting the city’semerging professionssuch as businessconsultancy and mediawith similar cover.

Well coveredMANCHESTER is not theonly city in the regionmaking waves in thefinancial world.Panmure Gordon, thestockbroker, is opening anoffice in the heart ofLiverpool, with a researchteam recently migratedfrom Numis.

Tim Linacre, the chiefexecutive, says that thecity has huge potential inthe small and mid-capbusiness area.

Liverpool move

Burning the midnight oil: Bank of New York’s stylish offices at 1 Piccadilly Gardens, Manchester



HARNESSINGBentley’s tradi-tions of quality, outstandingengineering and craftsman-ship to innovative, contempo-rary design has been the key tothe worldwide success of amarque that is a flagship ofmanufacturing excellence inthe North West.

Last year the company,which is based at Crewe,recorded the best annual salesand production figures in its88-year history.

Output reached 10,087 cars,with global sales in excess of9,200. The success was led bythe impressive first full-yearsales of the Continental FlyingSpur, which topped 4,500 deliv-eries worldwide, a perform-ance that was reinforced bythe unprecedented launch oftwo convertible models in asingle year — the ContinentalGTC and the Azure.

With entry prices for theContinental GT, known as theBaby Bentley and the mostsuccessful car in the com-pany’s history, starting at£117,500, and rising to£222,500 for the convertibleversion of the Azure, these arenot cars for the masses.

But there are increasingnumbers of people around theglobe who want to own a Bent-ley and have the financialclout to buy one.

America, Bentley's biggestmarket, accounts for morethan 40 per cent of sales, fol-

lowed by Britain and mainlandEurope.

Bentley Motors was found-ed in 1919 and has been produc-ing hand-assembled cars atCrewe since 1946.

The history of the firm hasbeen peppered with moretwists and turns than a grand

prix circuit, including receiver-ship, recession and redundan-cies but throughout it all thecompany has retained a com-mitment and belief in engineer-ing excellence, design innova-tion and craftsmanship.

Volkswagen acquired thecompany and site for £470 mil-

lion in 1998 and over the pastnine years has pumped in a fur-ther £500 million of invest-ment to develop the plant intoa world-leading car manufac-turing centre.

To provide the capacity tocope with the high levels of ini-tial order volumes for the Con-tinental Flying Spur, the tem-porary final assembly of a limit-ed number of the models wascarried out in Dresden. How-ever, that arrangement fin-ished last December and nowall Bentley production iscarried out at its historic homeof Crewe.

Bentley’s hallmarks of qual-ity include superb engineering,powerful performance, luxuri-ous leather and the finestwood veneers. But it was thelaunch of the Continental GTcoupe in 2003 with its modern,thrusting and sporty styling

that took the Bentley appeal toa new — and younger — gen-eration of aspirational, imageconscious owners around theworld. From Beijing to Bom-bay, from Seoul to Silicon Val-ley, the model has become thetransport-of-choice for success-ful individuals who prize theblend of traditional valueswith contemporary design andbreathtaking performance.

This year the convertibleversion of the Continental GTcollected two highly regardedawards within months of itsinternational launch.

It is not just the Bentleyname and all that it conveysthat is so important to the man-ufacturing status of the NorthWest. The company employs4,000 people at Crewe and im-pacts on the lives of tens ofthousands of others throughits network of suppliers.

BAE Systems is best knownfor its tanks, ships and air-craft, such as themulti-nation-al Typhoon, Nimrod MRA4,Tornado, Harrier and theJoint Strike Fighter, all ofwhich are, or will be, productsof its North West operations.But in an era of increasingly

smart-warfare, the company’srole is changing, a fact recog-nised by the name chosenwhen British Aerospacemerged with Marconi tocreate the current business.Today, BAE Systems’ opera-

tions at Warton and Salmes-bury in Lancashire are world-leading centres of innovationand technological excellencein systems development. Thecompany is a major employerin the North West with 8,000people on its books and thou-sands more in its supply chain.One of the company’s pri-

mary areas of focus is the raceto provide UK forces with theedge in autonomy and the IS-TAR (information, surveil-lance, tracking and reconnais-sance) as well as networksand information systems.BAE Systems were relative-

ly late into the unmanned aeri-al vehicle (UAV) race butsince it entered the field in2002, it has made progress.One of its projects is HER-

TI ( High Endurance RapidTechnology Insertion). TheUAV takes off with the clickof a mouse and, when it landslater after 25 hours of opera-tions, another click switches itoff. It has been flying its testmissions in the skies aboveScotland and Australia.PETER DAVENPORT

Crewe car that the world wants

ANEWEUDirective that willcome into force later this yearis expected to revolutionisethe way homes are bought,sold and rented in the UK andboost the demand for “intelli-gent” energy-saving glass.It amounts to good news for

Pilkington, one of the world’sleading manufacturers offloat, coated, rolled, laminat-ed and toughened glass prod-ucts. Its innovative K Glass re-flects heat back into a proper-ty, reducing energy wastagewhile letting in the sun’s heat.Energy performance certifi-

cates will be introduced aspart of the EU’s energy per-formance of buildings direc-tive, legislation that comesinto force in June and whichwill have significant implica-tions for the specification ofenergy-saving products, includ-ing energy-efficient glazing.The certificates will rate the

energy performance of eachproperty on a scale of A to G.They will also highlight topotential buyers how a

home’s energy efficiency canbe improved to bring savingson energy bills.As governments and con-

sumers become increasinglycost-conscious on energy, thedevelopment builds on a simi-lar rating scheme for win-dows used by the glazingindustry.Window energy ratings

(WERs) give consumers theopportunity to make in-formed choices about thetypes of windows installed intheir homes.About 20 per cent of the

heat in a house can be lostthrough single-glazed win-dows. By fitting new doubleglazing, such as insulatingglass units containing Pilking-ton's K Glass, the loss can bereduced by 50 per cent, bring-ing savings of up to £100 ayear on the energy bills of anaverage three-bedroom home.Products from Pilkington

have played an importantpart in creating an industryfirst. The industry body, the

British Fenestration RatingCouncil ( BFRC) has awardedthe first ever A-rated windowunder the WER scheme to aproduct using the firm’s KGlass and Optiwhite products.They were used by Piper

DoubleGlazing to develop a tri-ple-glazed sealed unit that wasthe first to achieve the highestenergy efficiency grade.Innovation has been a con-

stant theme for Pilkingtonsince the business first startedin 1826. Last year, Pilkingtonwas acquired by Nippon SheetGlass to create one of theworld’s largest companies inthe flat glass industry with36,000 employees, manufac-turing operations in 26 coun-tries an annual sales of £4 bil-lion in 130 countries.In the UK, Pilkington has a

workforce of 1,100 at its head-quarters in St. Helens, whichis the home of its three UKfloat manufacturing lines, aswell as a network of 23branches nationwide.PETER DAVENPORT

Pilkington in the forefront of Europe’sMIKE FRISBEE

BAe takesto theskies withnot a pilotin sight

0 1977: British Aerospace(BAe) is formed as anationalised entity by themerger of British AircraftCorporation and otherplanemakers.0 1999: After unsuccessfuldiversifications, thecompany focuses on thecore business of defenceand aerospace. BAeESystems created with themerger with GEC MarconiElectronic Systems.0 2005: BAE Systemsacquires United DefenceIndustries and becomesthe seventh leadingsupplier to the USDepartment of Defense.Sales exceed £12 billion.0 2006: BAE Systems sellsits 20 per cent stake inAirbus to EADS signallingits commitment to its coredefence business. ITemploys 88,000 people.

BAe factfile

Bentley is thechoice acrossthe globe,reports PeterDavenport

0 1919: Bentley Motors founded by W.O. Bentley.

0 1946: Production started in Crewe.

0 1998: Owned by Volkswagen AG. £500 million investmentin Crewe operations since acquisition.0 2003: won the Le Mans 24-hour race after five earlier vic-tories in 1924, 1927, 1928, 1929 and 1930.

0 2006: the best-ever year for production (10,087 cars) andsales (more than 9,200) in company’s 88-year with history.The “Baby Bentley”, the Continental GT, becomes its mostsuccessful car.

Bentley factfile

The convertible version of the Bentley Continental GT, whose modern and sporty styling has won a new, younger market

Hot stuff: arolled-glassplant atPilkington’sSt Helensfactory


HARNESSINGBentley’s tradi-tions of quality, outstandingengineering and craftsman-ship to innovative, contempo-rary design has been the key tothe worldwide success of amarque that is a flagship ofmanufacturing excellence inthe North West.

Last year the company,which is based at Crewe,recorded the best annual salesand production figures in its88-year history.

Output reached 10,087 cars,with global sales in excess of9,200. The success was led bythe impressive first full-yearsales of the Continental FlyingSpur, which topped 4,500 deliv-eries worldwide, a perform-ance that was reinforced bythe unprecedented launch oftwo convertible models in asingle year — the ContinentalGTC and the Azure.

With entry prices for theContinental GT, known as theBaby Bentley and the mostsuccessful car in the com-pany’s history, starting at£117,500, and rising to£222,500 for the convertibleversion of the Azure, these arenot cars for the masses.

But there are increasingnumbers of people around theglobe who want to own a Bent-ley and have the financialclout to buy one.

America, Bentley's biggestmarket, accounts for morethan 40 per cent of sales, fol-

lowed by Britain and mainlandEurope.

Bentley Motors was found-ed in 1919 and has been produc-ing hand-assembled cars atCrewe since 1946.

The history of the firm hasbeen peppered with moretwists and turns than a grand

prix circuit, including receiver-ship, recession and redundan-cies but throughout it all thecompany has retained a com-mitment and belief in engineer-ing excellence, design innova-tion and craftsmanship.

Volkswagen acquired thecompany and site for £470 mil-

lion in 1998 and over the pastnine years has pumped in a fur-ther £500 million of invest-ment to develop the plant intoa world-leading car manufac-turing centre.

To provide the capacity tocope with the high levels of ini-tial order volumes for the Con-tinental Flying Spur, the tem-porary final assembly of a limit-ed number of the models wascarried out in Dresden. How-ever, that arrangement fin-ished last December and nowall Bentley production iscarried out at its historic homeof Crewe.

Bentley’s hallmarks of qual-ity include superb engineering,powerful performance, luxuri-ous leather and the finestwood veneers. But it was thelaunch of the Continental GTcoupe in 2003 with its modern,thrusting and sporty styling

that took the Bentley appeal toa new — and younger — gen-eration of aspirational, imageconscious owners around theworld. From Beijing to Bom-bay, from Seoul to Silicon Val-ley, the model has become thetransport-of-choice for success-ful individuals who prize theblend of traditional valueswith contemporary design andbreathtaking performance.

This year the convertibleversion of the Continental GTcollected two highly regardedawards within months of itsinternational launch.

It is not just the Bentleyname and all that it conveysthat is so important to the man-ufacturing status of the NorthWest. The company employs4,000 people at Crewe and im-pacts on the lives of tens ofthousands of others throughits network of suppliers.

BAE Systems is best knownfor its tanks, ships and air-craft, such as themulti-nation-al Typhoon, Nimrod MRA4,Tornado, Harrier and theJoint Strike Fighter, all ofwhich are, or will be, productsof its North West operations.But in an era of increasingly

smart-warfare, the company’srole is changing, a fact recog-nised by the name chosenwhen British Aerospacemerged with Marconi tocreate the current business.Today, BAE Systems’ opera-

tions at Warton and Salmes-bury in Lancashire are world-leading centres of innovationand technological excellencein systems development. Thecompany is a major employerin the North West with 8,000people on its books and thou-sands more in its supply chain.One of the company’s pri-

mary areas of focus is the raceto provide UK forces with theedge in autonomy and the IS-TAR (information, surveil-lance, tracking and reconnais-sance) as well as networksand information systems.BAE Systems were relative-

ly late into the unmanned aeri-al vehicle (UAV) race butsince it entered the field in2002, it has made progress.One of its projects is HER-

TI ( High Endurance RapidTechnology Insertion). TheUAV takes off with the clickof a mouse and, when it landslater after 25 hours of opera-tions, another click switches itoff. It has been flying its testmissions in the skies aboveScotland and Australia.PETER DAVENPORT

Crewe car that the world wants

ANEWEUDirective that willcome into force later this yearis expected to revolutionisethe way homes are bought,sold and rented in the UK andboost the demand for “intelli-gent” energy-saving glass.It amounts to good news for

Pilkington, one of the world’sleading manufacturers offloat, coated, rolled, laminat-ed and toughened glass prod-ucts. Its innovative K Glass re-flects heat back into a proper-ty, reducing energy wastagewhile letting in the sun’s heat.Energy performance certifi-

cates will be introduced aspart of the EU’s energy per-formance of buildings direc-tive, legislation that comesinto force in June and whichwill have significant implica-tions for the specification ofenergy-saving products, includ-ing energy-efficient glazing.The certificates will rate the

energy performance of eachproperty on a scale of A to G.They will also highlight topotential buyers how a

home’s energy efficiency canbe improved to bring savingson energy bills.As governments and con-

sumers become increasinglycost-conscious on energy, thedevelopment builds on a simi-lar rating scheme for win-dows used by the glazingindustry.Window energy ratings

(WERs) give consumers theopportunity to make in-formed choices about thetypes of windows installed intheir homes.About 20 per cent of the

heat in a house can be lostthrough single-glazed win-dows. By fitting new doubleglazing, such as insulatingglass units containing Pilking-ton's K Glass, the loss can bereduced by 50 per cent, bring-ing savings of up to £100 ayear on the energy bills of anaverage three-bedroom home.Products from Pilkington

have played an importantpart in creating an industryfirst. The industry body, the

British Fenestration RatingCouncil ( BFRC) has awardedthe first ever A-rated windowunder the WER scheme to aproduct using the firm’s KGlass and Optiwhite products.They were used by Piper

DoubleGlazing to develop a tri-ple-glazed sealed unit that wasthe first to achieve the highestenergy efficiency grade.Innovation has been a con-

stant theme for Pilkingtonsince the business first startedin 1826. Last year, Pilkingtonwas acquired by Nippon SheetGlass to create one of theworld’s largest companies inthe flat glass industry with36,000 employees, manufac-turing operations in 26 coun-tries an annual sales of £4 bil-lion in 130 countries.In the UK, Pilkington has a

workforce of 1,100 at its head-quarters in St. Helens, whichis the home of its three UKfloat manufacturing lines, aswell as a network of 23branches nationwide.PETER DAVENPORT

Pilkington in the forefront of Europe’sMIKE FRISBEE

BAe takesto theskies withnot a pilotin sight

0 1977: British Aerospace(BAe) is formed as anationalised entity by themerger of British AircraftCorporation and otherplanemakers.0 1999: After unsuccessfuldiversifications, thecompany focuses on thecore business of defenceand aerospace. BAeESystems created with themerger with GEC MarconiElectronic Systems.0 2005: BAE Systemsacquires United DefenceIndustries and becomesthe seventh leadingsupplier to the USDepartment of Defense.Sales exceed £12 billion.0 2006: BAE Systems sellsits 20 per cent stake inAirbus to EADS signallingits commitment to its coredefence business. ITemploys 88,000 people.

BAe factfile

Bentley is thechoice acrossthe globe,reports PeterDavenport

0 1919: Bentley Motors founded by W.O. Bentley.

0 1946: Production started in Crewe.

0 1998: Owned by Volkswagen AG. £500 million investmentin Crewe operations since acquisition.0 2003: won the Le Mans 24-hour race after five earlier vic-tories in 1924, 1927, 1928, 1929 and 1930.

0 2006: the best-ever year for production (10,087 cars) andsales (more than 9,200) in company’s 88-year with history.The “Baby Bentley”, the Continental GT, becomes its mostsuccessful car.

Bentley factfile

The convertible version of the Bentley Continental GT, whose modern and sporty styling has won a new, younger market

Hot stuff: arolled-glassplant atPilkington’sSt Helensfactory



Peter Davenport on how twointo one works in MerseysideIN THE more than 40 yearssince Ford began operations atits Halewood plant, more thansix million vehicles have rolledoff the production lines. Thecompany has had to continual-ly invest and innovate to en-sure that theMerseyside facili-ty remained a premier manu-facturing location.

Such innovation is evidentby the achievement of havingthe award-winning Land Rov-er Freelander 2 and Jaguar X-Type travelling down the sameproduction line although thevehicles have different archi-tecture and no shared compo-nents, a world first in the auto-motive industry.

Manufacturing two com-pletely different models on thesame line has only been madepossible by a multi-millionpound investment and intro-duction of new and radical sys-tems and processes.

“Halewood Operations wasthe ideal choice for the all newFreelander 2,” says ThomasKlein, Halewood operationsdirector.

“The plant has alreadyproved it could build high qual-ity luxury vehicles with the Jag-uar X-Type and has received agreat deal of external recogni-tion for quality and leanmanu-facturing achievements.”

Preparing to build two com-pletely different vehicles alongthe same production line was ahuge challenge, Klein says.

“Our success has beenachieved through a winningcombination of a dedicatedand committed workforce, atotal focus on quality and awillingness to change and beflexible.The result is a worldclass plant and two world classproducts.”

Halewood Operations is abig employer on Merseysidewith around 2,500 employeesbased at the 300-acre site. Butits impact on the regional eco-nomy is much wider. Thereare 283 suppliers for Freeland-er 2 alone, for example, provid-ing 3,250 individual parts foreach vehicle, none of whichare shared with the X-Type.

Twenty-four of those sup-pliers are based in the NorthWest, creating and supportinghundreds of additional jobs.Six suppliers operate dedi-cated feeder plants on a suppli-er park next to Halewood.They include JCI, which pro-vides seats; Visteon, instru-ment panels; and Decoma,bumpers.

Halewood’s transformationbegan in 2000 when, afteralmost 40 years of producingFord vehicles, Jaguar tookover the site.

A significant investmentprogramme turned the plantfrom amass-production assem-bly operation to a world-classmanufacturing facility focusedon premium models.

The decision to produce

the two distinctively differentvehicles on the same produc-tion line held out significantcost and efficiency benefits,but also posed a major chal-lenge for the internal logisticsteam in managing parts deliv-ery and storage in the limitedspace available.

Innovations introduced in-clude a lineside flow-racking

system and the creation of per-manent locations around thesite for every part numberrequired in the manufacturingprocess. All stock can be deliv-ered lineside on a “just intime” basis, managed by theuse of a control system usingradio frequency technology.

When production opera-tors need more parts, they sim-

ply press a call button to sendan electronic request to the rel-evant part location. With thou-sands of models destined forthe export market, movingthem quickly and efficiently totheir point of departure is amajor logistical operation.

Freelander 2 alone is beingexported to 148 markets world-wide. A purpose-built railhead

was constructed in 2001 andcan cater for four specialisedtrains transporting up to 360vehicles a day from the plant.It handles more than 65 percent of all models intended forexport.

According to Jaguar, trans-porting Freelander 2 vehiclesby rail reduces road traffic by51,000 lorry journeys a year,the equivalent of 9.8 millionmiles per year and delivers a re-duction in carbon dioxide emis-sions by some 13,200 tonnesannually.

For three consecutiveyears, Halewood received thehighest score in a worldwideprocess audit of all Fordowned plants, helping to setglobal benchmarks for thecompany.

In recognition of this, alearning academy was openedat the plant and so far it hashelped to train hundreds ofmanagers from across Europe.

IN A world where airline trav-el has never been more popu-lar and risk of terrorism a dan-ger, the forecast rise in UK pas-senger numbers from 200mil-lion in 2003 to 500 million in2030 only serves to emphasisethe need for fast, accurate andreliable systems to screen themillions of items of baggagethat accompany those passen-gers. Multiply the figures on aworld basis andwhile the prob-lem looks daunting, the com-mercial opportunity is huge.CXR, a technology com-

pany based at East Manches-ter’s science and technologybusiness centre, One CentralPark, is pioneering new 3-Dscanning techniques that it isconfident will change the faceof airline baggage screening.It is a subsidiary of Rap-

iscan Systems, a division ofOSI Systems, a leader in secu-rity inspection utilising X-rayand gamma-ray imaging andadvanced threat identificationtechniques such as neutronand diffraction analysis.Its products are sold into

four key market sectors; bag-gage and parcel inspection, car-go and vehicle inspection, holdbaggage screening and peoplescreening. There are morethan 50,000 of its systems in-stalled around the world.CXR works on real-time to-

mography, which involvesscanning objects in slices toprovide accurate images, forexample, of items in suitcases.Last year it opened a high-

tech research facility on thebusiness park to be near the

University of Manchester, itspartner in a £750,000 re-search project aimed at im-proving air passenger safetyby providing fast, accurate 3DX-ray baggage images.The university was able to

help the firm to recruit eightspecialist engineers from theNorth West, including five ofits own graduates. The factthat Manchester Airport isnearby and a user of RapiscanSystems, was another benefit.PETER DAVENPORT


University security challenge

0 Founded in 18260 Headquarters in St. Helens0Member of the NSG(Nippon Sheet Glass) groupsince June 20060 One of world’s largestmanufacturers of glass andglazing products0 Combined annual sales ofNSG/Pilkington are about£4 billion0 Ownership/interest in 50float lines on five continents0 Annual output of 6.4million tonnes of float glass0 36,000 employeesworldwide0Manufacturing operationsin 26 countries0 Sales in more than 130countries0 Float process, invented bySir Alastair Pilkington in 1952is now the world standard forhigh quality glassmanufacture0 Inventors of the world’sfirst self-cleaning glass

Pilkington facts

energy-saving drive

Class act atHalewood

0 Ford manufactured carsat Halewood for almost 40years0 1990: New Escortlaunched following £600million of investment0 1991: Halewood's fivemillionth vehicle produced0 1993: Halewoodbecomes first plant inEurope to achieve ISO90000 1998: Halewood wins

manufacturing contract forJaguar X-Type0 2000: Last Ford Escortproduced on July 210 2001: First Jaguar X-Typerolls off production line0 2002: First Jaguar X-Typediesel is produced0 2002, 2003, 2004: Fordauditors rate Halewood“Best body and assemblyoperation in the world”

0 2003: first Jaguar X-TypeEstate is produced0 2004: Halewood wins“Environmental Business ofthe Year” award inrecognition of reductions inconsumption of energy, rawmaterials and water0 2005: 250,000th JaguarX-Type produced0 2006: first Freelander 2produced in October

Halewood factfile

World first: a Land Rover Freelander 2 and a Jaguar X-Type go down the same production line though they share no components

Cutting-edgepartners: EdMorton, right,of CXR, andprofessor BillLionheart ofManchesterUniversity

THE TIMES 19 MARCH 2007 1GX NORTH WEST ENGLAND 13


THE very word Manchesterfor me suggests life . From ear-liest childhood I heard thosesyllables, although we general-ly spoke of town.

Going to this place frommyhome in Salford was synony-mous with excitement. Thebus journeys were an endlesseducation, and the arrival inthe bustle of the old MarketStreet — the bus moving soslowly that I could gaze intoevery shop-window — gaveme no reason to doubt thatthis was the centre of the uni-verse. Manchester was infinite-ly varied but at the same timemarvellously contained. You

could walk everywhere, evenas a child. And so it remains.

Market Street has changeddrastically. It was seriously“Arndaled”, even if it has be-gun to recover from the out-break of yellow tiles. Nor is Pic-cadilly Gardens the private ref-uge it once was. (The construc-tion of the Arndale Centre inthe 1960s was controversialbecause it replaced a rich varie-ty of Victorian facades.)

But the city’s expansionhas not spoilt the essential cosi-ness of the place, the sense itgives of being on a humanscale; of providing what thewriter Simone Weil, thinking

of the oppression of new con-crete cities, charmingly calleda humus— “a living, warm en-vironment, full of companion-ship in which the uprooted canlive and find their salvation”.

Leaving theology aside,though the always active cathe-dral is one of the glories of theplace, Manchester is surely anadmirable city for the re-located. It seems to be growingfacilities all the time.

It astounds the sceptical na-tive with its profusion of newapartment buildings. Who arethe people who are evidentlycrying out to live here? Howcan all these spaces be filled?But they are. And more mod-ernist blocks go up in the styl-ish dockside development ofSalford Quays, and more ofthe old textile warehouses areconverted into debonair lofts.

What used to be the dull(Knott Mill) end of Deansgateis now the site of the NorthWest’s most visible and ex-traordinary building, theBeetham Tower, a visionaryglass structure of such heightand apparent fragility (thenext wind must surely blow itover) that one cannot quite be-lieve it is there.

However, it contains thatmost solid of entities, a HiltonHotel, and we know it will notreally topple because the archi-

tect himself lives in the pent-house.

Bars, cafés and restaurantsnaturally proliferate in thewake of such developments,andManchester has some out-standing shops — a VivienneWestwood boutique tuckedaway near what used to be theBank of England of the North;a spacious portmanteau build-ing containing both a Marks &Spencers and a Selfridges; andone of the biggest, pleasantest,best-stocked Waterstone’s.

Near Waterstone’s onDeansgate is the North West’s

most distinguished musicshop, Forsyth’s, still in thesame premises, with their dis-tinctive Moorish windows,after 150 years. If you weary ofthe Mancunian pace ofchange, all you need do is en-ter the showroom, where classi-cal music blends with the tin-kle of pianos being tuned, tobe wafted back to the 1950s.

Music has long beenamong the city’s attractions.The country’s first permanentprofessional symphony orches-

tra, the Hallé, gave it first con-cert here in 1858 and is playingbetter than ever, based at thepurpose-built BridgewaterHall. The excellent BBC Phil-harmonic performs there too,and the smaller-scale Man-chester Camerata.

Between Bridgewater Halland the public spaces of theRoyal Northern College ofMusic, musical activity in Man-chester is more bustling thanin any British city after Lon-don. As if to underline the fact,an ambitious biennial musicfestival starts up this summer.

The other arts are far fromneglected: the City Art Galleryis a superb, modernised estab-lishment; the Royal ExchangeTheatre and Library Theatrecompanies are long-provenand adventurous. The latter ishome to the Central Library,which with its British Muse-um-style round reading room,is itself a great Manchester as-set. At the Lowry centre in Sal-ford Quays, opera, theatre andballet flourish alongside thevisual arts, while on the oppo-site bank of the ManchesterShip Canal sits Daniel Libes-kind’s resplendently fracturedImperial War Museum of theNorth.

The list begins to soundboastful. But the area has bene-fited hugely from cultural initi-

atives, and the BBC’s plan tomove 1,500 employees to theQuays can only be a furtherstimulus to improvement.

Of course, there is more tothe city than culture. Not faralong the canal from themuseum is Old Trafford, and ifManchester is a wonderfulplace for sport, it now pro-mises, since the award of asupercasino, to be a wonderfulone for gambling, too. The cityhas travelled far from its abjectindustrial image, yet many ofthe mill buildings survive, notall of them “suitably” trans-

formed, and a sense of commu-nity is palpable.

The construction of a tramsystem that in parts follows thetracks used in the early part ofthe last century provides atouching image both of the con-tinuity and “liveability” ofMan-chester, for trams are the mostcomfortable kind of transport.You can get around in this cityand more than get by in it.

Paul Driver is the author ofManchester Pieces

Paul Driver remains in awe ofManchester — the city thatcaptured his heart as a child

Infinitelyvaried butvery neatlycontained

What was the dullend of Deansgatenow houses anextraordinary tower

The tram systemin parts followstracks used inthe last century

0 The Lowry Hotel: RoccoForte’s hotel is the firstfive-star offering in the areaand the first to join theprestigious The LeadingHotels of the World group. Acontemporary building in theChapel Wharf area.50 Dearmans Place,Chapel Wharf.(0161) 827-4000www.thelowryhotel.com

0 Hilton ManchesterDeansgate: You can spotthe building from miles away— the Beetham Tower, thecity’s newest landmark. Thehotel is in the lower 23floors. Nearby is everythingyou need in a city includingtwo great soccer clubs.303 Deansgate(0161) 870-1643www.hilton.co.uk

0 Great John Street Hotel:If you like a butler at yourbeck and call this is for you.It has ultra-modern glitz on aold school house. Meetingrooms are styled the girls’and boys’ classroom andthere are rooms and aterrace for entertainment.Great John Street,Castlefield(0161) 831-3211www.greatjohnstreet.co.uk

0 Yang Sing: became thefirst “ethnic” restaurantawarded a pestle and mortarby the Good Food Guide forits Cantonese fare. Therestaurant has a new 1930sShanghai-style decor andcan offer everything fromsnacks to banquets.34 Princess Street(0161) 236-2200www.yang-sing.com

0 Juniper: with its singleMichelin star this is the placeto be seen on a night outfrom Manchester or theCheshire commuter belt.Gordon Ramsay says that itis a powerhouse of theNorth.21 The Downs, Altrincham,Cheshire(0161) 929-4008www.juniper-restaurant.co.uk

0 Lounge 10: it would beeasy to miss this little gemwith its bland exterior. Insideyou will find three floors ofglamour and sophisticationreminiscent of a 19thCentury Parisian nightclubwith red velvet and crystalchandeliers.10 Tib Lane(0161) 834-1331www.lounge10manchester.co.uk

WHERE TO STAY, EAT AND DRINK IN MANCHESTER

Bon appetit:the centre ofManchestertakes on aMediterraneanlook insummer asshoppers eatal fresco inDeansgateLocks

IAN LAWSON PHOTOGRAPHY

Hallé home:BridgewaterHall, theorchestra’sstunningnew base

BRIGITTE BOTT/ALAMY



A REMARKABLE face-lift isalready taking place on thestreets of Liverpool as it warmsup for its year-long exposureas European Capital of Cul-ture for 2008. An initial £95million programme of morethan 70 events has been an-nounced, with the LiverpoolCulture Company pulling to-gether a wide variety of music,dance, fashion, film, literature,science, theatre and visual arts.

Tate Liverpool will presentGustav Klimt: Painting, DesignandModern Life in Vienna 1900.As a spin-off, the Royal Liver-

pool Philharmonic Orchestraoffers two Viennese balls.Under Vassily Petrenko, itsyoung Russian conductor, theorchestra has lined up a seriesof newworks including a Requi-em by John Tavener, in Liver-pool’s Metropolitan Cathedral.Sir Simon Rattle makes a re-turn to his home city to con-duct the RLPO and will bringhis Berlin players to Philhar-monic Hall in September.

Art exhibitions will be de-voted to James Tissot — his la-

dies who lounge exhibited inthe decorous surroundings ofneighbouring Port Sunlight’sLady Lever Gallery — and theinfluence of railways on art, il-lustrated in work by Turner,Monet, Van Gogh and Hop-per. as well as a focus on LeCorbusier, the architect.

The Everyman Theatre ishoping to secure Warrington-born Pete Postlethwaite toplay his first King Lear while,up the road, the Playhouse billincludes a new version ofChekhov’s Three Sisters, set inLiverpool in 1948.

Towards the end of nextyear the city launches ShippingLines, a literary festival inwhich Roger McGough leads adistinguished line-up of poetsand writers. After the openingof Liverpool Film Studios lastyear , four local films are cur-rently in production. Film Artsand Creative Centre is hostinga new media festival.

Great moments of Euro-pean football will be set tomusic by Michael Nyman, anda floating stage spectacular atAlbert Dock, will celebrate Liv-erpool’s dockside regenerationand popular music heritage.

The 2008 Tall Ships’ Raceis expected to attract one mil-lion spectators and the2007/2008 Clipper Round theWorld Yacht Race will end at

Albert Dock. During the yearthere will be many otherevents including the MerseyRiver Festival, Grand NationalFestival and the Lantern Pa-rade for the Chinese NewYear.

Nominated as aWorld Her-itage Centre in 2003, Liver-pool boasts no fewer than

1,500 listed buildings. TheRoyal Liver Building on thewaterfront at Pier Head isamong the most famous St.George's Hall, one of the mostfamous neo-classical buildingsin Europe, whose fabulousfloor of Minton tiles recalls themercantile prosperity of 19thcentury Liverpool, reopens

next month after a £23 millionrestoration. Another famousbuilding, the Adelphi Hotel,will be immortalised in a newmusical. Cities on the Edge ex-plores links between Liverpooland other port cities.

Closer to home, other partsof the North-West will comple-ment Liverpool. Cheshire cele-

brates its green environmentin Year of Gardens; Lancashireand Blackpool their culinaryheritage in Taste Lancashire;Cumbria and the Lake Districtgear up for an adrenalin-rais-ing Year of Adventure andManchester flexes its musclesfor A Year of World Sport.www.liverpool08.com

HUGH ROUTLEDGE/TNL

JOHN COGHILL/APTOBY MELVILLE/REUTERS

DENIS O’REGAN/AP

Great moments ofEuropean footballwill be set to musicby Michael Nyman

Liverpool’s year of living delightedlyLynne Walker says the city willcertainly live up to the title ofEuropean Capital of Culture

0Malmaison Hotel: Theopening of the Malmaison inJanuary has launched therun-up to the EuropeanCapital of Culture year in finestyle with a sharp, modernhotel on the Prince’s Dock.All rooms feature Malmaisonluxury and attention to detail.Prince’s Dock.(0118) 983-1348www.malmaison.com.

0 Hope Street Hotel: Thecity’s first boutique hotel isset in the Georgian quarterbetween the two cathedrals,within easy reach of theuniversities and concert hall.Built in 1860 in a palazzostyle it has been thoroughlymodernised.40 Hope Street(0151) 709-3000.www.hopestreethotel.co.uk

0 62 Castle St: A Grade lllisted building that wasoriginally built in 1868 as abank, it is very much part ofthe city’s architecturalheritage.It features chilled out chicwith cool classics in anexclusive package.62 Castle Street(0151) 702-7898www.62castlest.com.

0 The London CarriageWorks: The restaurantopened in 2003 as part ofthe chic Hope Street Hoteland quickly established itselfas one of the city’s bestunder chef Paul Askew.It achieved Liverpool’shighest score for cooking inthe Good Food Guide 2006.(0151) 705-2222www.hopestreethotel.co.uk

0 60 Hope Street: If youare looking for a classy placeto hold a private party, alaunch or even apost-theatre dinner, it issituated at the heart of thecreative quarter of the cityand close to the UnityTheatre, The Everyman andThe Philarmonic Hall.(0151) 707-6060.www.60hopestreet.com.

0 Alma de Cuba: A sassyCaribbean-themed bar andrestaurant set in what wasonce St Peter’s CatholicChurch. Your favouritecocktails can now beenjoyed with great food fromthe mezzanine kitchen thatoffers choice dishes such asrib eye steak and venison.St Peter’s Church, SeelStreet (0151) 709-7097.

WHERE TO STAY, EAT AND DRINK IN LIVERPOOL

AS A Liverpudlian without ascouse accent, I probably talkabout where I was born morethan most. People usuallythink they are being clever.They learn that I am fan ofLiverpool FC and thenpounce. “So you are a gloryhunter,” they proclaim. “Whatmade you support Liverpool?”I delight in telling them I wasborn in the city and broughtup on Belmont Road in thedistrict of Anfield.My family moved away

when I was still small but notso far that we did not driveinto Liverpool every weekend.One of my aunts lived directlyopposite Liverpool’s stadium.

We would sometimes park inher drive when attending amatch. There was a price topay as she and my cousinswere Evertonians and theywould moan that on a point ofprinciple they never usually letLiverpool fans use their drive.The city was endlessly fasci-

nating to me as I grew up. Ifwe were on a trip to the towncentre I would actually lookforward to the moment ascruffy boy demanded car pro-tection money from my dad.He was happy to pay and saidthe car would be betterlooked after than if left in acar park. My home back thenwas in between Liverpool and

Manchester and my friendswere divided as to which wasthe better place to shop. I sup-poseManchester had some de-cent shops but as a city I couldbarley believe that anyonewould plump for Manchester.Liverpool has a freshness, a

constant breeze from theMer-sey and the sort of beauty youonly get from a city on thewater. I would stare and stareat the Liver birds on the Liverbuilding; and have met peoplesince who refuse to believeLiver birds really do watchover the city.The only disappointing

place was, and is, StanleyPark. As the garden that sepa-

rates the red and blue halvesof the city I always thought itshould be more impressive. Itwas where I was pushed in apram and the place where Iwould hear the roar of thecrowd when I could not getinto Anfield. It will soon bethe site of a new football sta-dium and to outsiders itwould seem natural and cer-tainly economical if the twofootball clubs shared it.But this is Liverpool and

that will never happen. Thereis enough space, thank good-ness, for the clubs to face upto their own kind of regenera-tion alone.ALYSON RUDD

Confessions of a glory hunter

“On me head,son”: AlysonRudd has alittle helpfrom ArseneWenger whileawaiting thecall fromAnfield

Aspects of Liverpool: a sea of red celebrates the club winningthe European Cup; a familiar face returns to the Cavern Cluband tall ships will pay homage to its maritime history next year


A REMARKABLE face-lift isalready taking place on thestreets of Liverpool as it warmsup for its year-long exposureas European Capital of Cul-ture for 2008. An initial £95million programme of morethan 70 events has been an-nounced, with the LiverpoolCulture Company pulling to-gether a wide variety of music,dance, fashion, film, literature,science, theatre and visual arts.

Tate Liverpool will presentGustav Klimt: Painting, DesignandModern Life in Vienna 1900.As a spin-off, the Royal Liver-

pool Philharmonic Orchestraoffers two Viennese balls.Under Vassily Petrenko, itsyoung Russian conductor, theorchestra has lined up a seriesof newworks including a Requi-em by John Tavener, in Liver-pool’s Metropolitan Cathedral.Sir Simon Rattle makes a re-turn to his home city to con-duct the RLPO and will bringhis Berlin players to Philhar-monic Hall in September.

Art exhibitions will be de-voted to James Tissot — his la-

dies who lounge exhibited inthe decorous surroundings ofneighbouring Port Sunlight’sLady Lever Gallery — and theinfluence of railways on art, il-lustrated in work by Turner,Monet, Van Gogh and Hop-per. as well as a focus on LeCorbusier, the architect.

The Everyman Theatre ishoping to secure Warrington-born Pete Postlethwaite toplay his first King Lear while,up the road, the Playhouse billincludes a new version ofChekhov’s Three Sisters, set inLiverpool in 1948.

Towards the end of nextyear the city launches ShippingLines, a literary festival inwhich Roger McGough leads adistinguished line-up of poetsand writers. After the openingof Liverpool Film Studios lastyear , four local films are cur-rently in production. Film Artsand Creative Centre is hostinga new media festival.

Great moments of Euro-pean football will be set tomusic by Michael Nyman, anda floating stage spectacular atAlbert Dock, will celebrate Liv-erpool’s dockside regenerationand popular music heritage.

The 2008 Tall Ships’ Raceis expected to attract one mil-lion spectators and the2007/2008 Clipper Round theWorld Yacht Race will end at

Albert Dock. During the yearthere will be many otherevents including the MerseyRiver Festival, Grand NationalFestival and the Lantern Pa-rade for the Chinese NewYear.

Nominated as aWorld Her-itage Centre in 2003, Liver-pool boasts no fewer than

1,500 listed buildings. TheRoyal Liver Building on thewaterfront at Pier Head isamong the most famous St.George's Hall, one of the mostfamous neo-classical buildingsin Europe, whose fabulousfloor of Minton tiles recalls themercantile prosperity of 19thcentury Liverpool, reopens

next month after a £23 millionrestoration. Another famousbuilding, the Adelphi Hotel,will be immortalised in a newmusical. Cities on the Edge ex-plores links between Liverpooland other port cities.

Closer to home, other partsof the North-West will comple-ment Liverpool. Cheshire cele-

brates its green environmentin Year of Gardens; Lancashireand Blackpool their culinaryheritage in Taste Lancashire;Cumbria and the Lake Districtgear up for an adrenalin-rais-ing Year of Adventure andManchester flexes its musclesfor A Year of World Sport.www.liverpool08.com

HUGH ROUTLEDGE/TNL

JOHN COGHILL/APTOBY MELVILLE/REUTERS

DENIS O’REGAN/AP

Great moments ofEuropean footballwill be set to musicby Michael Nyman

Liverpool’s year of living delightedlyLynne Walker says the city willcertainly live up to the title ofEuropean Capital of Culture

0Malmaison Hotel: Theopening of the Malmaison inJanuary has launched therun-up to the EuropeanCapital of Culture year in finestyle with a sharp, modernhotel on the Prince’s Dock.All rooms feature Malmaisonluxury and attention to detail.Prince’s Dock.(0118) 983-1348www.malmaison.com.

0 Hope Street Hotel: Thecity’s first boutique hotel isset in the Georgian quarterbetween the two cathedrals,within easy reach of theuniversities and concert hall.Built in 1860 in a palazzostyle it has been thoroughlymodernised.40 Hope Street(0151) 709-3000.www.hopestreethotel.co.uk

0 62 Castle St: A Grade lllisted building that wasoriginally built in 1868 as abank, it is very much part ofthe city’s architecturalheritage.It features chilled out chicwith cool classics in anexclusive package.62 Castle Street(0151) 702-7898www.62castlest.com.

0 The London CarriageWorks: The restaurantopened in 2003 as part ofthe chic Hope Street Hoteland quickly established itselfas one of the city’s bestunder chef Paul Askew.It achieved Liverpool’shighest score for cooking inthe Good Food Guide 2006.(0151) 705-2222www.hopestreethotel.co.uk

0 60 Hope Street: If youare looking for a classy placeto hold a private party, alaunch or even apost-theatre dinner, it issituated at the heart of thecreative quarter of the cityand close to the UnityTheatre, The Everyman andThe Philarmonic Hall.(0151) 707-6060.www.60hopestreet.com.

0 Alma de Cuba: A sassyCaribbean-themed bar andrestaurant set in what wasonce St Peter’s CatholicChurch. Your favouritecocktails can now beenjoyed with great food fromthe mezzanine kitchen thatoffers choice dishes such asrib eye steak and venison.St Peter’s Church, SeelStreet (0151) 709-7097.

WHERE TO STAY, EAT AND DRINK IN LIVERPOOL

AS A Liverpudlian without ascouse accent, I probably talkabout where I was born morethan most. People usuallythink they are being clever.They learn that I am fan ofLiverpool FC and thenpounce. “So you are a gloryhunter,” they proclaim. “Whatmade you support Liverpool?”I delight in telling them I wasborn in the city and broughtup on Belmont Road in thedistrict of Anfield.My family moved away

when I was still small but notso far that we did not driveinto Liverpool every weekend.One of my aunts lived directlyopposite Liverpool’s stadium.

We would sometimes park inher drive when attending amatch. There was a price topay as she and my cousinswere Evertonians and theywould moan that on a point ofprinciple they never usually letLiverpool fans use their drive.The city was endlessly fasci-

nating to me as I grew up. Ifwe were on a trip to the towncentre I would actually lookforward to the moment ascruffy boy demanded car pro-tection money from my dad.He was happy to pay and saidthe car would be betterlooked after than if left in acar park. My home back thenwas in between Liverpool and

Manchester and my friendswere divided as to which wasthe better place to shop. I sup-poseManchester had some de-cent shops but as a city I couldbarley believe that anyonewould plump for Manchester.Liverpool has a freshness, a

constant breeze from theMer-sey and the sort of beauty youonly get from a city on thewater. I would stare and stareat the Liver birds on the Liverbuilding; and have met peoplesince who refuse to believeLiver birds really do watchover the city.The only disappointing

place was, and is, StanleyPark. As the garden that sepa-

rates the red and blue halvesof the city I always thought itshould be more impressive. Itwas where I was pushed in apram and the place where Iwould hear the roar of thecrowd when I could not getinto Anfield. It will soon bethe site of a new football sta-dium and to outsiders itwould seem natural and cer-tainly economical if the twofootball clubs shared it.But this is Liverpool and

that will never happen. Thereis enough space, thank good-ness, for the clubs to face upto their own kind of regenera-tion alone.ALYSON RUDD

Confessions of a glory hunter

“On me head,son”: AlysonRudd has alittle helpfrom ArseneWenger whileawaiting thecall fromAnfield

Aspects of Liverpool: a sea of red celebrates the club winningthe European Cup; a familiar face returns to the Cavern Cluband tall ships will pay homage to its maritime history next year



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