Abacuss: Bridging Research & Industry

How can we engage in increasingly uncertain times, and empower people to make a difference? Can we tackle this in a sustainable way, and how can social science research help to enable behavioural change?

In a one-off special Gaitherin event, we considered new approaches to working in partnership and providing new avenues for businesses to engage with social scientists. The new Abacuss platform will drive real-world use of innovative, world-leading social science research, widen networks for future collaborations and provide a platform to develop business relationships.

To address these challenges, new forms of collaboration are required. This event provided an opportunity for businesses, academics, policy makers and others interested in entrepreneurship, intrapreneurship and collaborative working to start exploring ways of working together.

We heard from Helen Taylor (of Ecotricity and Forest Green Rovers) on how to tackle some of these larger questions via this online event, exploring Ecotricity’s entrepreneurial journey, and how Ecotricity has managed to change the face of the energy sector. Funded by Aspect, Helen talked about novel insights into ‘sustainability disruption’ in the clean energy market and professional football. Helen’s presentation traced the ‘green entrepreneurial’ journey of the clean energy company Ecotricity and their sister company Forest Green Rovers Football Club. Following Helen’s address, we had the opportunity for a Question & Answer session.

The Universities of Glasgow, Manchester and Sheffield were delighted to welcome Helen to launch our first online event, and to launch Abacuss; helping to bring social scientists and industry partners closer together.

Photo credit: Candeo gauisus via Wikipedia

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