THE FIRST WORD

If ever the importance of the technology industry to the UK economy needed highlighting, it arrived with a resounding thud last month. The collapse of Silicon Valley Bank sent the sector into a tailspin, almost leading to the Government rescuing its UK business before Europe's biggest lender HSBC eventually acquired it. The panic that surrounded its demise signalled the huge strategic importance of UK tech, which is identified as pivotal to the country's future economic success.

The sector is packed with high-growth start-ups that are developing innovations with the potential to solve everyday problems and global challenges.

In this issue of Business Network, we provide a platform to some of those companies in the East Midlands deploying smart technology for smart business purposes.

Our big interview (p27) is with George Pritchard, technical director at Scenariio, the Derbybased firm that is helping to create smart buildings and workplaces by installing sensor technology. He talks to my colleague Jasmine Thompson about how the data gleaned from this system gives insights into everything from where heat is escaping in a building to desk usage, enabling occupants to make decisions that can save money, energy and carbon.

There are other great examples in our focus feature (p64) – The Simulator Company has developed a training simulator for surgeons practising life-saving open heart and lung surgery techniques; Devtank’s environmental sensor and energy monitoring device has created a “smart factory” for another Chamber member; Affari Media has designed a virtual replica of a multinational’s cyber security operations centre to help it win new clients; and Batfast’s artificial intelligence-driven cricket simulator is “re-engineering how sports are played and experienced”.

We also feature some relevant thought leadership articles from a couple of patrons –Blueprint Interiors examines emerging technologies in the workplace (p32) and Duncan & Toplis explains the growing importance of data analytics in auditing (p82). The Chamber’s Digital Marketing Conference, covered on p76, likewise had a smart technology flavour.

Returning to this column’s opening remarks, despite its failure, it’s worth remembering that Silicon Valley Bank played an important role in turning the San Francisco Bay Area from a burgeoning local tech cluster in the 1980s into the globally-significant one it is today.

The scale of the response to its eventual fate demonstrates that small tech finance is now mainstream finance, and so too are the start-ups in the tech ecosystem.

In the East Midlands, we should cherish these companies and help them to help us.

Dan Robinson, Editor, Business Network