Women in Digital Innovation (WIDI) is on a mission to grow, empower and support women led digital innovation businesses. At a pilot event in Sheffield on 29 March, the network will provide a space for women in digital innovation, across various disciplines and sectors, to exchange know-how, talk frankly and get help to take the

We created the Senior Leaders Dinners because leaders of our company member organisations told us they wanted a space to reconnect with the community (following the pandemic) and to meet others in similar positions, facing the same issues. Our first dinner was a sell-out and the feedback told us that this type of meetup filled

Pendo is a SaaS company which brings product analytics, in-app guidance and feedback together in one product management platform. More than 8,700 companies use Pendo to provide ‘better software experiences’ to 700 million people every month. Pendo launched their Feedback and Roadmaps products when it acquired Receptive’s product feedback platform. Now valued at $2.6 billion,

Economic Update Delivered by Lewis Adams, Corporate Policy Officer at SYMCA, this update covered the Prime Minister’s new year pledges, employment and the labour market, energy, inflation, exchange rates, interest rates, economic growth, industry and business, and consumption. Lewis’s key takeaways were: Inflation seems to have peaked South Yorkshire’s labour markets continue to tighten… …But

For anyone who hasn’t come across your company before, please can you give us a quick reminder about what Mina does? Mina’s co-founders came together to solve a problem: as a lot of businesses migrate to electric vehicles at scale, how do they pay for the charging of those vehicles? So, we’re a B2B SAAS

The SIAN is a region-wide network of incubators, accelerator programmes, investors and local authorities working together to make South Yorkshire an accessible, thriving economy. A big challenge for any startup is finding the right founders to work with on a new venture, and members of the SIAN are reporting that this is a particular issue

Chris Dymond, Director of Sheffield Digital, is our representative on the Business Advisory Group, and will attend meetings every eight weeks. Other group member organisations include the region’s Chambers of Commerce, the Federation of Small Businesses, MakeUK, the CBI, SY Community Foundation, the trade unions, Sheffield Property Association, the Cutler’s Company and representatives from the

Over the past year I’ve been working closely with mentors and mentees to make sure they feel supported in their roles, to answer questions, and to stay informed about how things are going with our matches. It’s been great to receive positive feedback and suggestions for improvement, which we’re putting in place in 2023. Feedback

The Scale-up Route – who is it for? This route can be used by UK businesses that hold a Scale-up sponsor licence. To qualify for a licence the DCMS says a business must “meet the published definition of a scaleup, which can be verified through checks with HMRC”. You can check the criteria on pages

Just 4% of UK tech startup founders are women and under 17% of all active companies are led by women. The Founder’s Journey event set out to shine a spotlight on female tech founders in Sheffield, to inspire those who are considering their own venture, and to provide honest insight into the highs and lows

Born out of frustration at the barriers faced by founders and innovators trying to get MVPs to market, Verticode uses a proprietary automation toolkit to accelerate the software development process. Effectively, they make it cheaper and faster to get a software product into the market for testing. Customers can pay up to 90% less than

2022 at Sheffield Digital Chris Dymond, a director of Sheffield Digital, opened the event with some information about our organisation and how we have been doing over the past year. This included the number of members we have (74 companies and 88 individuals) and how many we’ve gained in 2022 (eight and 18 respectively). Chris

Learn to do user research Paper’s first course is designed for people who have some experience of either doing user research or working with user research. This might include those working in their first user research role, or retraining in this specialist area. The course will be delivered to a small group, allowing the facilitators

Sheffield Digital currently has 77 company members and 82 individual and freelance members, plus a variety of sponsors and partner organisations. Our new company membership manager will be responsible for engaging with the organisation’s company members in a way which builds value, awareness and engagement, and for building relationships with companies who are not yet

Can you provide a brief overview of how the first cohort of the mentoring scheme went, throughout 2021? There has been a really positive response from the community in terms of people signing up to the scheme, and setting up the initial meetings. What we need to work on is maintaining and developing the relationships

BJSS approaches its new offices like new businesses, applying a start-up model to get things off the ground. Mike explains, “As delivery manager, I am expected to run my offices (Mike has recently opened a base in Lincoln, too) like my own business. So, whilst we have the breadth and depth of the BJSS machine

Tes employs over 600 people in 10 offices across the world, including in London, Sheffield, Hong Kong, Melbourne, Sydney, and Dubai. Originally a printed newspaper supplement to support schools and teachers with their work, the company has expanded its products and services over the years, transforming into a global EdTech company. Throughout this transformation, Tes

Within weeks of the world entering lockdown in 2020, users of online gaming platforms such as Steam and Twitch soared. The popularity of video gaming, and particularly online gaming, increased as many people picked up a controller to help reduce the stresses and anxieties of social restrictions and lockdowns, as well as using online games

The event is part of a series of South Yorkshire Cultural and Creative Industries Network sessions open to a full spectrum of creatives, including those who work in theatre, TV, film, publishing, arts, design, music, photography and much more. It is free to join and will be held at Barnsley’s Digital Media Centre from 5.30pm

Our last two festivals have been entirely virtual due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Across the 2020 and 2021 festivals, the community hosted over 60 online events, ranging from masterclasses, product demos and virtual exhibitions, to webinars and panel discussions. We are hopeful that our 2022 festival will have some in-person events and experiences, although we

The Awards, which were presented at a ceremony at Manchester’s Science & Industry Museum on 21 October, were judged by an independent panel (which included our very own Chris Dymond) during a two-stage process. ‘Small Tech Company of the Year’ went to Razor, who stood out amongst strong competition including Leeds-based XR Games and Manchester’s

The South Yorkshire Cultural & Creative Industries Network has been established after the success of the Cultural and Creative Industries Summit in Sheffield last month. It will offer a collaborative, supportive space for people who work or volunteer their time across the full spectrum of creative industries including theatre, TV, film, publishing, design and music.

According to a separate report produced by the United Nations University (UNU), the ‘Global E-Waste Monitor 2020’, 53.6 million metric tonnes (Mt) of electronic waste was generated globally in 2019, up 21% in five years. More than 20% of this is made of screens and small IT equipment. The UNU predicts that global e-waste –

The team at BRM see massive potential in Sheffield City Region’s digital industries. They want to use their expertise to help more tech businesses, and particularly start-ups, to realise their ambitions and achieve growth and commercial success. BRM’s approach is to work with clients rather than for them, educating them and equipping them with the

So far, 21 mentors have signed up to the scheme, offering many different skills and areas of expertise. We have 12 mentees on the scheme, and some of these have been matched with more than one mentor, giving us 14 matches in total. Our mentees have signed up to the scheme for many different reasons.

Why interview a graduate from the Developer Academy? The courses are all completely fee-free to unemployed people in our region, thanks to funding secured from the government’s Skills for Jobs initiative and Sheffield City Council. This, and the fact that no prior tech experience is needed to apply, means the training is more accessible to

Why and when did you start the Sheffield DM meetup? Officially, Sheffield DM started in November 2018 as a remedy to the lack of great digital marketing events in the wider Sheffield and South Yorkshire region. In reality, the idea stemmed a good year before that after I tweeted about an inkling of an idea

The EyUp Skills coding course will be delivered in partnership with the award winning iO Academy. It is a fully immersive 16 week Full Stack Track, teaching people all they need to know to get their first job as a software developer. Learning in small classes from professional developers with real-life experience, students gain practical

The Developer Academy has been selected to offer a full-time Data Science Bootcamp, as part of the government’s Lifetime Skills Guarantee and Plan for Jobs. Fully funded by the Department for Education (DfE), this programme runs over 12 weeks and begins in November 2021. Delivered remotely, it teaches a tried-and-tested data science curriculum to ensure

Robert and his team are making near-net-shape manufacturing methods such as casting and additive manufacturing (techniques that produce items very close to their final (net) shape), an attractive option for the volume production of complex, bespoke and time-sensitive components. This is useful for industries including aerospace, automotive, energy and medical. Using robotic technology to remove

Tes, which opened its office in St Paul’s Place in Sheffield city centre in 2018, already employs over 200 people in the city. This new engineering hub will employ a further 20 software engineers based in Sheffield. Tes has been actively involved in many education and tech initiatives since arriving in the city, for example

HSHG is delivered in partnership by Sheffield Hallam University, The Sheffield College and RNN Group, and is part-funded by the European Social Fund Programme 2014-2020. SMEs, start-ups and microbusinesses in Sheffield City Region can access a tailored business package to support their innovation and to help them develop new opportunities. The programme offers a diagnostic

Founded over a decade ago by owners Ryan and Gemma Daniels, Hydra Creative is now a 19-strong team of digital professionals. As a full-service digital agency, the team is made up of experts in UX, digital marketing, multimedia, 3D Design, software development, account management, SEO, videography and graphic design. Despite the company’s growth, Hydra Creative

The UKRI Centre for Doctoral Training (CDT) in Speech and Language Technologies (SLT) and their Applications is a collaboration between UKRI (the UK’s national academic research funder), The University of Sheffield, and industry partners. Through an eight year funding period, approximately 60 PhD students across five cohorts will complete a unique four year training programme

Our new company member, CityFibre is building full fibre networks across the UK to transform cities through world-class digital connectivity. Residents and businesses in Sheffield will, over the course of the next five years, benefit from faster and more reliable internet connections, after CityFibre began building the city’s new digital infrastructure earlier this year. What

The video guides you through the lifespan of a tech business, from the early stages, through to growth and maturity, and up to the stage of preparing to sell the business. Throughout the journey, you are given practical advice and suggestions about how you can use and manage your finances to support growth and business

Playground Playground has invited some of the world’s most innovative artists, developers and companies specialising in creative and interactive play, to show their cutting-edge projects in Sheffield this July. Playground is aimed at 5-12 year-olds, however everyone is welcome to visit during Site Gallery’s opening hours, to make some noise, enjoy yourselves and have fun.

Steve Shinn was based in London and working as CTO for a digital agency when he had the idea for Disputed’s first solution, CaseFunnel, in early 2018. He noticed a trend in mass claims and class action lawsuits, like the high profile VW emissions scandal, and cases against price-fixing in the football shirt industry. This

Sheffield Technology Parks Sheffield Technology Parks was keen to safely reopen its co-working space – The Cooper Lounge – as soon as possible following last year’s lockdown, and this year was no different. Chief Executive, Tom Wolfenden, comments: “The New Year lockdown was disappointing news for our staff and customers. As we’ve said before, many

Can you give us an overview of your career to date, and how you got to the role you are now in? I was recently introduced to the term “squiggly career” by Sophie, Sheffield Digital’s Community Manager, which is definitely the ideal description of how I made my way to my current role! I studied

What is an Institute of Technology (IoT)? The Department of Education, IoT Wave 2 prospectus gives the following description: “IoTs are a new type of institution, with a prestigious and distinct identity delivering higher level technical education with a clear route to high skilled employment. IoTs will strengthen and grow provision to help bridge a

After overcoming the challenges felt through the industry and beyond in 2020, Evoluted is excited by its strong start to the year. The client wins are two long-term retainer contracts with Mountain Boot Co, a distributor of outdoor brands, and Talasey, a UK supplier of landscaping products and solutions. Both companies have partnered with Evoluted

Why mentoring? After consulting with our Individual Members about what they wanted from their membership, we could see there was demand to create a scheme where people could develop themselves and work towards a career goal. And what better way to do that than tapping into the wealth of knowledge and experience that exists among

Sheffield-based hospitality technology company Airship has won three awards at the UK Developer Awards 2021 – including the prestigious Dev Team of the Year accolade. The team also won Project of the Year and Innovation of the Year awards in recognition of the speedy development and rollout of Trck.to, a track and trace solution for

About the campaign Even in the midst of a global pandemic, our Jobs Board has stayed busy. Week after week, we are posting amazing opportunities to join the region’s most innovative and exciting companies. This is all great news, so why the campaign? The jobs exist, but we are not connecting the dots to help

“When you become a freelancer, you’re not just taking on one role, you become the project manager, the accountant, the CEO, the client manager… freelancing is running a business.” We took this quote from a very handy and recent blog post published by Creative Boom. We love it and have included it here because it’s

Trend 1 – Remote Working Unsurprisingly, 43% of the businesses who responded plan to offer full time remote working over the next 12 months. In addition, 29% have reduced their office space and the percentage of businesses who described themselves as “office only” dropped from 24% before the pandemic to 4% at the time of

Mina was started by Ashley Tate and Chris Dalrymple. After meeting through Sheffield Digital, Ashley and Chris combined their expertise – and a shared passion for increasing the number of EVs on the roads – to create a unique tech solution. Ashley, an entrepreneur and founder of several businesses including Split the Bills, understands the

The Summit is organised by the BGI and is just one of the events happening during Games Careers Week, designed to inspire people from all backgrounds to discover careers in one of the UK’s fastest-growing creative sectors. As the tech sector and UK games industry adjust to new immigration rules (explained in this post), which

How does it work? Inspiring the Future from Education and Employers has a free online portal for schools and colleges, and for individuals who want to volunteer. On signing up, teachers can publish specific opportunities, search for volunteers that meet their criteria, and invite them to participate. Volunteers can use the portal to search for