Severn-Hafren

NIPC Severn/Hafren

IP and technology law news and comment from the Greater Bristol and South-East Wales city regions.

Wednesday 23 August 2017

Cardiff FinTech Company in Dubai Accelerator Programme










Jane Lambert

Delio Ltd, a wealth management platform software developer based at the Cardiff Business Technology Centre, is one of 11 companies to be selected for the first cohort of the Dubai International Financial Centre FinTech Accelerator Programme (see British Participation in Dubai FinTech Accelerator Programme 22 Aug 2017 NIPC Gulf), The other companies come from the USA, United Arab Emirates, Jordan, Azerbaijan, India, Singapore and Sweden.

In the 13 weeks of the programme, the successful firms will experience:
  • "Mentoring from the industry’s leading firms and senior financial services executives
  • Insider knowledge and direct feedback from their target user groups
  • Workshops and panel discussions on topics such as procurement, regulation and industry trends,
  • Opportunities to raise their profile amongst potential partners and investors, and
  • A workspace in DIFC for two employees throughout the programme."
At the end of the programme, Delio and each of the other businesses will have the opportunity to bid for investment.  I have described the programme in FinTech in Dubai 3 Aug 2017.

To gain its place on the programme Delio had to compete against 100 other proposals from over 32 countries which included big data and analytics, the blockchain, payments, peer to peer and crowdfunding, roboadvisors, and mobility technologies. 

Delio is one of 21 businesses located at the Technology Centre (see the CBTC's company profiles page) one of which is a branch of Chapman & Co.

Should anyone wish to discuss this article or any related topic, he or she should call me on +44 (0)20 7404 5252 during office hours, or send me a message through my contact form.

Sunday 6 August 2017

Why NIPC Severn-Hafren?

Author US Government
Copyright not asserted
Source Wikipedia














Jane Lambert

The Severn estuary divides Greater Bristol and Gloucestershire the Welsh cities of Cardiff and Newport. Because of its tides and currents, the river once acted as an effective barrier between Saxon and Celt but there are now two fine road bridges and a tunnel as well as the M4 motorway which connect them. If anyone was wondering about "Hafren" it is Weksh for the Severn. According to Wikipedia, it takes its name from a Celtic princess called Hafren who was drowned in the river by her stepmother. Her name in Latin was Sabrina and we have anglicized it to Severn.

I had originally intended to launch a blog on IP and technology in South-West England but the region is so large and so diverse that such a blog would have been of very little use to businesses and  individuals there. It includes some of the most prosperous parts of the United Kingdom but also some of the least. The region breaks up naturally into three parts, namely the Bristol City Region which includes much of Gloucestershire, Thomas Hardy's Wessex (that is to say, Devon, Dorset, Somerset and Wiltshire) and Cornwall. The distance between northern Gloucestershire and the Lizard peninsula is about the same as the distance from Gloucestershire to the Scottish border. Geography imposes a limit to what the constituent parts of that region could possibly have in common.

It occurred to me that very much the same could be said of Wales. That principality has two industrial districts originally based on mining and heavy industry in the south-east and northeast. The rest of Wales is rural but the Wye Valley and Pembrokeshire have a very different feel to Snowdonia or even to one another. The Brecon Beacons in the South are different again.

On the other hand Bristol, Cardiff and Newport are very close together. So close that many who work in Cardiff and Newport commute from Bristol and Gloucestershire and many who live in Cardiff and Newport travel to work in the opposite direction. Only 45 miles separate central Cardiff from Central Bristol which is slightly less than the distance between the centres of the Northern Powerhouse cities of Leeds and Manchester. The journey by rail from Cardiff to Bristol takes approximately the same time as the journey between Leeds and Manchester.  Greater Bristol and South East Wales may not regard themselves as such but they are for all intents and purposes a single conurbation of nearly 2 million inhabitants. They may lie in different nations but then the New York conurbation straddle three separate states while the Bâle, Fribourg, Mulhouse conurbation in three different countries, one of which is outside the EU.

The idea that South-Eas Wales and Greater Bristol could be a western powerhouse has already been canvassed by civic leaders in Bristol, Cardiff and Newport (see the press release Great Western Cities one step closer to realising Britain’s Western Powerhouse 12 Feb 2016  Metro Dynamics and John Murray Brown Bristol, Cardiff and Newport launch ‘Great Western Cities’ 12 Feb 2016 Financial Times). Metro Dynamics published a report entitled Britain's Western Powerhouse in support of greater cohesion and collaboration between the three cities.

The combined city regions would have a lot of strengths: the IPO is at Newport, international airports in Bristol and Cardiff, three world class research universities in Bristol, Bath and Cardiff and fine teaching universities nearby, good motorway and rail links to London, Heathrow and the Channel Tunnel, a highly skilled work force with a high percentage of graduates and beautiful countryside. great theatre and other attractions.

Should anyone wish to discuss this article, call me on 020 7404 5252 during office hours or send me a message through my contact form.

Small Claims Track IP Litigation in Bristol

Author Arpingstone   Public Domain Jane Lambert In Small Claims Track IP Litigation in Bristol and Cardiff   (10 July 2019) I wrote: "...