By John Mathers, Judge for the Impact Awards 2023.
At the British Design Fund we invest in well-designed, purpose-led British products. Importantly, as well as much-needed funding for the manufacturing sector we believe that the early stage enterprises we support need mentoring help as much as they need the money.
That mentoring support can cover a huge range of areas, from finance to sales and marketing strategy, supply chain advice to manufacturing sourcing. And it’s particularly with regards to that last area that we are pleased to have, this year, formed a strategic partnership with Made in Britain.
We are, by necessity, completely pragmatic about where the products we support are manufactured. But, increasingly, we are supporting and helping our companies to look to Britain first before automatically looking for the cheapest price abroad. All too often we have found that this gives us a far greater guarantee of quality, real in-depth engineering and manufacturing expertise and the ability to take decisions quickly and efficiently.
We have been doing a series of blogs with MiB, featuring some of our most recent investee companies. Two particular examples from these blogs came to mind as I was writing this.
Firstly, Adam Root, CEO and Founder of Matter, a company committed to ridding the world of microplastics, talked compellingly about the ability of jumping in the car and driving from Bristol (where they are based) to Birmingham to review progress on tooling – as opposed to spending days travelling with attendant language and communication challenges.
Robert White, of Robert White Motorcycles, talked engagingly about the UK being the source of the best engineering skills in the performance car and motorbike sports sector and how the M40 corridor boasts the skills and experience of which the rest of the world is in awe.
All of this reflects why I’m delighted to be a judge in this year’s Made in Britain Awards and am looking forward to viewing all of the entries. At the British Design Fund we truly believe that the time for British manufacturing is now. The innovation and design skills we’ve always had in this country are being fully realised and valued.
John Mathers
Chair, British Design Fund
John has been working for over forty years in the brand and design industry, leading a number of marketing, brand and design consultancies in the UK and Internationally including WPP’s flagship Brand Consultancy, the Brand Union. In 2017 he co-founded The British Design Fund, a venture capital fund supporting well-designed, purpose-led British product start-ups.
By Made in Britain 1 year ago | By Made in Britain