The Hub 100 launches site to support growth companies

The Hub 100 - a group of the 100 most significant companies across all sectors of industry but located in the Brighton & Hove area - has launched a new web site to support its work.

The site - www.thehub100.com - is designed to provide member companies, key suppliers and, crucially, other businesses in the area with a channel to support each other, share experience and knowledge and, increasingly, to collaborate in business ventures.

Alongside news, events, profiles and talking point debates, the site has an expanding knowledge bank, already containing nearly 50 articles - many of them written by Hub 100 companies or key suppliers - offering advice and ideas on issues local companies need to tackle to achieve swifter growth.

Peter Burden, director of The Hub 100, said: "With a critical mass of more than 60 companies signed up as members of the Hub 100 we are moving into a new phase of development. We are now concentrating on the relationships between the companies so that they can improve the ways they co-operate and collaborate with each other. The web site will be an important tool in this work."

He said members of the network are already setting direction for the group by identifying the sort of events, workshops and other support they need.

"The site reflects this approach, and is being populated with content that deals with issues members have said they most want addressed. For example, a key focus for the group is increasing sales, and the site will evolve to support this need, and others that emerge."

"The site is designed to be useful, not grand or flashy. This is a starting point not the end of the process. The site will continue to develop to meet needs of The Hub 100 companies and the broader business community. For example, we expect interactivity on the site to grow as the dialogue within the community develops and matures."

"The opportunity", he said, "is to find a way to effectively share knowledge and experience between the Hub 100 companies and in the broader business community."

The immediate aim of The Hub 100 is to increase the turnover of the companies by £50 million and to attract £20 million of investment into them, and hence the local economy, over the three-year lifetime of the project. The group will also act as a 'spearhead' to encourage and develop other smaller companies in the area.

Launched last September, the Hub 100 is funded by the South East England Development Agency (SEEDA) and the Brighton & Hove regeneration partnership. It is supported by Brighton & Hove Council and a wide range of local businesses and supplier organisations.

Wired Sussex is acting as a lead partner in managing the development and running of the site, which was designed by Epic, the Brighton-based knowledge and e-learning company.

The Hub 100 has built up a database of more than 2,500 companies in the area and is using a variety of measurements and assessment tools to select businesses to join the group working in partnership with accountants, Baker Tilly. Details on how to contact the group are on the Web site.