The University of South Wales (USW) has the highest rate of graduate entrepreneurship of any university in Wales, shows new research.
According to the Higher Education and Community Interaction survey a total of 89 new firms were started by USW graduates in 2019-20, an increase of 345% since 2016-17, when only 20 such businesses were spun-out of the institution.
USW was followed by Swansea University, 63, University of Wales Trinity Saint David, 51, Cardiff University, 47, Cardiff Metropolitan University, 43, Glyndwr University, 29 and Bangor, 22.
Graduate start-ups for the ranking was based on business started by recent graduates regardless of where any IP resides, but only where there has been formal business/enterprise support from the HE provider.
USW said its ranking was down to a greater emphasis on entrepreneurship across the institution in recent years.
For example, the first dedicated graduate incubator in Wales - the Startup Stiwdio - was developed at the University’s Cardiff campus, from an old students union building to support those graduates from the faculty of creative industries taking their first steps into entrepreneurship.
Two further Stiwdios - at the Newport and Treforest campuses - are planned over the next six months as a result of increased interest in starting new businesses from the student population at both sites.
Professor Dylan Jones-Evans, assistant pro-vice chancellor for enterprise at USW said: “Despite the challenges of the Covid 19 pandemic, we saw more new firms being established in Wales than ever before and, more importantly, increasing numbers of young people are looking to start businesses as they reconsider their future careers,
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“USW is totally committed to help all of those graduates who are looking to take the first step into developing their ideas into new businesses and, whilst we have achieved some success to date, we are looking to develop better ways of integrating enterprise and entrepreneurship into everything we do at the University and ensuring that more graduates are encouraged and supported into starting a new business”.
To build upon a range of different programmes already being run across the institution, a new programme was recently initiated to install an entrepreneurship champion into all 10 academic schools. This is the first time this has happened within a Welsh university and is being supported by the Higher Education Funding Council for Wales (HEFCW).
These posts will be the first point of contact for those students and graduates within the school who are planning to start a business. They will also support new programmes in enterprise and help to develop of community of entrepreneurs and supporters.
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One of the newly-appointed champions is Adam Williams, director of the School of Design and Digital.
He said: “Enterprise education and the development of enterprising attitudes in individuals and teams is a core attribute delivered across all courses within the school of Design and Digital at USW,
“As a result, we feel that our students will be well placed to add significant social, cultural, and economic value to society throughout their careers due to the embedded nature of the challenge-based curriculum we design for them.”