Enterprise City (ECUK), the new creative and digital industries cluster at St. John’s, is pleased to announce that Arcadis, the leading global design & consultancy firm, is hosting its second design thinking programme Deep Orange at Enterprise City in Manchester this week, from 12 to 15th September.
Building on the first programme in Amsterdam, Deep Orange is a co-creation innovation programme based on the fundamental principles of design thinking for natural and built assets, bringing together around 50 multidisciplinary professionals to identify digital opportunities for key public and private organisations across London and Manchester.
Jonathan Moore, Manchester City Executive for Arcadis commented: “Manchester is truly one of the UK’s leading cities for digital enterprise. It is the largest technology hub outside of London and benefits from having one of Europe’s largest city economies. With companies ranging from UKFast and Cisco to Hitachi and MoneySuperMarket, along with major media corporations such as the BBC and ITV all choosing Manchester as a base, the digital technology sector is thriving. Business collaboration is an ethos that seems to run throughout the region, and we’re really pleased to be hosting our Deep Orange innovation programme at Enterprise City. There is a real spirit of cutting edge leadership and entrepreneurial attitude here in Manchester, and we hope to be able to draw on that for Deep Orange.”
Deep Orange Manchester will work together with organizations on how to drive change in today’s digital age and focus on several innovative solutions driven by real problems faced by clients, citizens and society. Clients and partners involved in Deep Orange Manchester include Greater Manchester Combined Authority, Manchester Airport Group, HSBC, Lloyds Bank Group, Welsh Water and Enterprise City, St. John’s.
Manchester has been tempting a growing number of tech and digital start-ups away from the capital and now boasts over 52,000 tech positions within the city. Arcadis and ECUK continue to champion Manchester as a global destination for enterprise and Deep Orange will bring a new initiative for collaboration and productivity into the city for businesses off all sizes.
Daisy Barnes at ECUK, commented “We kicked off our programme of activity at ECUK with a programme of live events in April. Moving through 12 creative industries in 12 months we’ve seen live output in fashion, publishing and Film/TV and our project with Arcadis sees the creation of live ideas within the design, technology and infrastructure spheres. ECUK has been designed to be forward-thinking, unique and outward-looking and we look forward to welcoming some of the world’s most prominent and pioneering brands to our growing new neighbourhood.”
Enterprise City, which is being built on the site of Manchester’s Old Granada Studios from 2017-2020 will be an incubator for businesses within the creative industries from start-up to grown-up, allowing them to grow and evolve under the ECUK umbrella. The site which has now begun refurbishment works on its first building, the iconic Bonded Warehouse will see a collection of over seven spaces develop over the coming three years.