Leicester Innovation Festival 2025: Redefining innovation to support business growth
- Emily Miller
- 1 day ago
- 3 min read
Dr Nik Kotecha OBE DL highlights the importance of innovation.
Innovation is often misunderstood; seen as something exclusive to tech giants or academic institutions. But as Leicestershire Innovation Festival 2025 has demonstrated, innovation is happening all around us, in businesses of every size and sector.
In this thought-provoking piece, Dr Nik Kotecha OBE DL reflects on a week of inspiring conversations, networking, and partnerships. He explores how businesses across Leicester and Leicestershire – from manufacturing to life sciences – are innovating, even if they don’t always realise it.
Dr Nik Kotecha OBE DL on Leicester Innovation Festival 2025
It’s been a week of incredible conversations, networking, and partnerships at Leicestershire Innovation Festival 2025. The networking and learning opportunities the festival provides are so key – because innovation isn’t always easily understood, and sometimes it’s not easy to think about how to implement it.
And it isn’t a coincidence either. You don’t usually innovate in your business on an ongoing basis just by accident… but it is also true that many businesses I’ve worked with and spoken to are innovating, though they often wouldn’t describe it that way. As a result, they don’t always gain the full advantages that an innovative business can bring.
So, what is innovation? Well, I find it’s still an often-misunderstood term. The ‘shorthand’ people use is that it’s “new stuff, new ideas, new inventions, academic concepts…”
Stanford defines it in a way I like: “An innovation, by definition, is the process of developing or renewing a technique or product to create or improve value. From innovative entrepreneurs to established businesses, there are many different types of innovations that people and businesses can leverage.”
Let’s unpack that. This definition of innovation starts with renewing a technique or product. Whatever your business, you use techniques, perhaps you provide services or products for your customers. Or all of the above! So, you’ll know innovation is for you. In fact, you’re probably continually innovating, but some may not have recognised it as such.
The definition also touches on creating or improving value. This is where we have huge scope to increase productivity and strengthen our business balance sheets by adding value within our companies. Innovative businesses often review and refine techniques, improve service delivery, and enhance outputs, all while building core business value at pace.
Academic practices that emerge from hypotheses and conceptual ideas are also innovative, but what I like about the Stanford definition is that it recognises that innovation doesn’t stop at the idea : academic or otherwise.
In fact, this definition highlights something I strongly believe: innovation is not just about new or remodelled “things”, it’s much more about an organisational culture that continually strives for more, for better, for added value, and for meeting emerging or anticipated customer needs.
That idea has really stood out this week, as I’ve helped launch and take part in Leicestershire Innovation Festival. It’s been inspiring to hear from so many businesses delivering remarkable offerings and to witness the tremendous appetite for growth within our city and county, driving our economy forward.
I was pleased to see the festival agenda covering topics that have been central to my own business journey over time, from exporting for growth to securing capital for novel initiatives. It was also great to see dedicated platforms for manufacturing and life sciences, as these industries form part of the Midlands’ core economic capabilities.
I use those words deliberately because our strategic location underpins our region as a manufacturing hub, with the ability to reach 90% of the UK population within four hours. Our life sciences ecosystem is equally significant, with linked strengths in med-tech, pharmaceuticals, and clinical trials, all supported by our world-class universities and medical schools.
Of course, there is far more to Leicester and Leicestershire’s economy, from textiles and green tech to finance, professional services, retail, hospitality, and tourism. Ours is a diverse economy, but one defined by a few shared traits across sectors.
These include the entrepreneurial passion of our business leaders, something I’ve seen first-hand over many years. They also include resilience and tenacity, particularly given the challenges we face in the Midlands, such as unequal access to government investment and skilled talent, challenges that are well-documented.
We are a business community that does not stand still. We respond to changing needs, evolve with consumer and business demands, and continuously innovate. And not just in ideas, though we have plenty of those, but in our practices, processes, people, and products. By doing so, we are driving business growth, increasing productivity, attracting and retaining talent, and strengthening our balance sheets.
It’s been a privilege to be part of this year’s Leicestershire Innovation Festival – to champion this message once again and to advocate for continued, essential investment in the infrastructure and ecosystem of innovation. Both central and local government must support this, as it remains the foundation for regional economic growth.
