Month: February 2020

In support of Leicester Innovation Week – and because Morningside Pharmaceuticals are once again proud headline sponsors of the LeicestershireLive Innovation Awards  – Dr Nik Kotecha OBE looks at how putting Continuous Improvement at the heart of a business’ Innovation Strategy can deliver positive business benefits. 

Getting a business’ Innovation Strategy right can be a juggling act.

If you focus too much on turning creative ideas into reality, it can come at the detriment of the business’ day-to-day operations.

Likewise, too little focus on innovation may cause problems further down the line, as competitors catch up and begin to take market share.

The solution to this is to ensure a balanced approach is built into your plans, which is where Continuous Improvement can play an important role.

At first glance, this may seem like an unusual partnership as continuous improvement and innovation are two different philosophies.

Continuous improvement is about making a commitment to looking at ways that an organisation can continually get better. Whereas innovation is the process of turning new ideas and concepts into business benefits, such as increased productivity.

So how do these two different approaches harmonise to deliver the best of both worlds?

For my business, Morningside Pharmaceuticals, continuous improvement is a big part of innovation. For example, as we built our Quality Management System (QMS), which ensures the absolute quality of the medicines we manufacture, we signed up to a number of international standards.

This helped build structures because the standards involve identifying weaknesses and developing strategies to embed improvements. We are then inspected regularly to measure that we meet the different credentials. As a business, we like to be challenged, and have found that taking guidance from external experts through audits and inspections has supported this process.

Once you have embedded a culture of continuous improvement into business systems it will then deliver many more opportunities for innovation to take place.

For Morningside, this has led to all departments constantly reflecting on, and analysing quarter to quarter data, to look for trends. They are always learning from this data, which enables them to fine tune our activities and generate new ideas and innovations to deliver further improvements and efficiencies. These innovations then streamline our approach to getting our products into the marketplace, which makes the business more successful.

My advice would be to see both innovation and continuous Improvement as integral parts of your Innovation Strategy. They share clear synergies, which if balanced correctly will create the necessary structures to free up time and resource to embed an innovative corporate culture.

By building a culture of continuous improvement, businesses can achieve real gains in efficiency and productivity that will then lead to reduced wastage, improved quality and increased customer satisfaction.

Morningside’s Chief Executive Dr Nik Kotecha OBE has been appointed Co-Chair of Charnwood Borough Council’s Town Deal Board – the first meeting of which took place this week.

The business and community leaders have come together to kickstart a project to secure up to £25 million of government funding to transform in Loughborough’s economic growth.

Charnwood Borough Council hosted the first meeting of the Loughborough Town Deal Board which will manage the development of a town investment plan and submission of bids to the Government’s Town Deal initiative.

The deals aim to regenerate town centres, boost businesses and improve infrastructure and connectivity.

The Loughborough Town Deal Board is being co-chaired by Dr Kotecha and Cllr Jonathan Morgan, leader of Charnwood Borough Council.

Cllr Morgan said: “The Town Deal is a huge opportunity to bring a significant amount of investment to Loughborough and I am delighted the board has met for the first time.

“There is a tremendous amount of positivity and enthusiasm about the potential of the Town Deal fund and I look forward to seeing ideas develop.

“The board members all agreed that collaboration and involving all sectors of the community will be a critical component of success.

“The first meeting was very much about making sure we have the right structures in place so we can move forward at pace and secure the best Town Deal for Loughborough.”

Dr Nik Kotecha OBE, added: “The funding from the government’s Town Deal Fund and the overall Loughborough Town Centre Masterplan will create jobs, increase productivity and boost skills throughout the borough. The meeting of the Town Deal Board is a crucial first step towards ensuring that Loughborough continues to be a thriving market town and major hub for the Charnwood community.”

The Loughborough Town Deal Board will now co-ordinate the development of a Town Investment Plan which will provide a vision for building on the town’s unique strengths to transform its economic growth prospects.

At its first meeting the board agreed a governance structure including the creation of a sub-group to oversee community engagement and consultation. It also agreed to use government funding already awarded to the Council to commission external support to help with the bid and community engagement.

Town Deals can be used to redevelop vacant buildings and land, drive private sector investment by supporting small businesses and ensure young people have the skills they need to get good jobs. Communities will also be able to consider how they can boost their transport links and increase access to high-speed broadband.

Morningside Pharmaceuticals has made a large donation of antibiotics to help treat 600 patients at an African hospital.

The packs of the antibiotic Clarithromycin, which is used to treat respiratory illnesses, were donated to the Ekwendeni CCAP Mission Hospital in Malawi.

The donation was particularly important to the local community as pneumonia is the second most common illness and cause of death at the hospital, which does not have regular access to high quality medicines.

The medicines were delivered through charity Inter Care – Medical Aid for Africa, based in Syston, which specialises in sending high quality medical Aid to rural health units in sub-Saharan Africa including Tanzania, Malawi, Zambia, Ghana and Sierra Leone.

Jean Widdowson, Inter Care Trustee and Chair of their Medical Panel, said: “We are so grateful for this donation from Morningside Pharmaceuticals, which has made a huge difference to patients’ lives at the hospital. Thank you for your support and for providing these essential medicines for Africa.”

For the hospital’s staff, the antibiotic has been particularly well received because it enables them to treat a wider range of illnesses. Dr Donatien Twizelimana, Chief Medical Officer at the hospital, said: “This antibiotic offers a broad spectrum of effects and provides us with another strong oral antibiotic, which will be a huge help when treating our patients.”

Dr Nik Kotecha OBE, Chief Executive of Morningside Pharmaceuticals, said: “We’re delighted to be working in partnership with Inter Care to provide high quality generic medicines to communities throughout Africa.

“Morningside was founded on the vision of making quality healthcare an affordable and accessible reality throughout the world, so it’s a real privilege to be able to make this donation to communities in Africa, which urgently need quality medical supplies.”