b'ForewordA FEW WORDS FROM OUR CEOIn December 2022, the National Biofilms InnovationINNOVATIONCentre (NBIC) received additional funding from theWe will launch our first Proof of Concept/translational Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Researchfunding call and will continue to provide a unique Council (BBSRC) and Innovate UK to continue ourforum for accelerating academic-industry partnerships important work. NBIC remains focused on supportingto allow biofilm research approaches to be translated and connecting the industrial and academic biofilminto innovation across multiple sectors.We are community across the UK and with our internationalworking with regulatory bodies to enable the partners. We judge ourselves by our ability to harnessdevelopment of standards that enable claims for and translate the capability, knowledge and technologybiofilm-focused products.in the prevention, detection, management and engineering of biofilms across the UK. TRAININGWe continue to build our cohort of PhD students across In last years report I stated that, we believe we areour four core universities for whom we are running a having significant impact across all these dimensions. core Doctoral Training Centre in Biofilms Innovation, This year I can report the extent of this impact. NBICsTechnology and Engineering (BITE).In October 2021, total economic impact has been calculated as part of anBBSRC awarded NBICs Industrial Advisory Board an external economic impact assessment to be 204m overannual allocation of funds from their Collaborative the first 4 years of our operations. NBICs intent remainsTraining Partnerships (CTP) scheme to support to behave in a national, inclusive and transparent way tointerdisciplinary PhD studentships. The CTP scheme is benefit our community.This year we will be launchinga doctoral training programme directed at industrial a membership scheme for industry partners and weresearch challenges and delivered by consortia will bring in additional academic partners that shareled by businesses in collaboration with research our desire to collaborate and connect with over 260organisations. Our call for project applications is companies, which we continue to engage with across acurrently open, so if you are interested, please visitrange of sectors.our website to find out more.Over the next year we will deliver some of our ambitiousIt is very clear that everyone involved in biofilms across plans in our three key pillars:the UK remains jointly committed to our vision of delivering both breakthrough science and technologies RESEARCH to control and exploit biofilms, and to inspire the next Our funding has allowed us to continue to supportgeneration of research leaders and entrepreneurs.our cohort of Interdisciplinary Research Fellows (IRFs)- PROFESSOR JO SLATER-JEFFERIES, NBIC CEO, across our four core universities. They are all activelyAUGUST 2023engaged in a mixture of underpinning research and projects with industry partners. 3'