Innovation Manager at InnoScot Health, Fiona Schaefer analyses an essential facet of developing ideas into innovations

Helping the NHS to innovate remains a key priority during this period of recovery and reform. Even within the current cash-strapped climate, there is the opportunity to maximise the first-hand experience of the healthcare workforce and its knowledge of where new ideas are needed most.

Entrepreneurial-minded, creative staff from any discipline or activity are often best placed to recognise areas for improvement – the reason why a significant number of solutions come from, and are best developed with, health and social care staff.

NHS Scotland is a powerful driver of innovation, but to truly harness the opportunities which new ideas offer for development and commercialisation, the knowledge and intellectual property (IP) underpinning them needs to be protected. That vital know-how and other intangible assets – holding appropriate contracts for example – are key from an early stage.

Medical devices can take years to develop and gain regulatory approval, so from the outset of an idea’s development – and before revenue is generated – filing for IP protection and having confidentiality agreements in place are ways to start creating valuable assets. This is especially important when applying for patent protection because that option is only available when ideas have not been discussed or presented to external parties prior to application.

Without taking that critical initial step to protect IP, anyone – without your permission – could copy the idea, so anything of worth should be protected as soon as possible, making for a clear competitive advantage and ownership in the same sense as possessing physical property.

The common theme is that to be successful – and ultimately support the commercialisation of ideas that will improve patient care and outcomes – the idea must be novel, better, quicker, or more efficient than existing options. Furthermore, to turn it into a sound proposition worth investing in, it must also be technically and financially feasible. It isn’t enough to just be new and novel – the best innovations offer tangible benefits to patient outcomes and staff working practices.

Of course, even more so in the current climate of financial constraints, the key question of ‘Who will pay for your new product or service?’ needs to be considered up front as well.

Whilst development of a strong IP portfolio requires investment and dedicated expertise, when done well and at the appropriate time, then it is resource well spent, offering a level of security whilst developing an asset which can be built upon and traded. There are various ways commercialisation can progress and whilst not all efforts will be successful, intellectual property is an asset which can be licensed or sold to others offering a range of opportunities to secure a good return.

In my experience, however, many organisations including the NHS are still missing the opportunity to recognise and protect their knowledge assets and intellectual property early in the innovation pathway. This is partly due to lack of understanding – sometimes one aspect is carefully protected, whilst another is entirely neglected. In other cases, the desire to accelerate to the next stage of product development means such important foundational steps are not given the attention required for long-term success.

Good IP management goes beyond formally protecting the knowledge assets associated with a project, e.g. by patenting or design registration, however. When considered with other intangible assets such as access to datasets, clinical trial results, standard operating procedures, quality management systems, and regulatory approvals, it is the combination which will be key to success.

Early securing of IP protection or recognition of IP rights in a collaboration agreement, demonstrates foresight and business acumen. Later on, it can significantly boost negotiating power with a licensing partner or build investor confidence.

Conversely, omissions in IP protection or suitable contracts can be damaging, potentially derailing years of product development and exposing organisations to legal challenges and other risks. Failing to protect a promising idea can also mean commercial opportunities are missed, thus leading to your IP being undervalued.

Ideas are evaluated by formal NHS Scotland partner InnoScot Health in the same way whether they are big or small, a product, service, or new, innovative approach to a care pathway.

We encourage and enable all 160,000 NHS Scotland staff, regardless of role or location, to come forward with their ideas, giving them the advice and support they need to maximise their potential benefits.

Protecting the IP rights of the health service is one of the cornerstones of InnoScot Health’s service offering. In fact, to date we have protected over 255 NHS Scotland innovations. Recently these have included design registration and trademarks for the SARUS® hood and trademarks for SCRAM®, building and protecting a recognised range of bags with innovative, intuitive layouts. Spin outs such as Aurum Biosciences meanwhile have patents underpinning their novel therapeutics and diagnostics.

We assist in managing this IP to ensure a return on investment for the health service. Any revenue generated from commercialising ideas and innovations from healthcare professionals is shared with the innovators and the health board through our agreements with them and the revenue sharing scheme detailed in health board IP and innovation policies.

Fundamentally, we believe that it is vital to harness the value of expertise and creativity of staff with a well-considered approach to protecting IP and knowledge input to projects from the start.

By Nej Gakenyi, CEO and Founder of GRM Digital

Many businesses have embarked on their digital evolution journey, transforming their technology offerings to upgrade their digital services in an effective and user-friendly way. Whilst this might be very successful for smaller and newer businesses, but for large corporations with long-standing legacy infrastructure, what does this mean? Recently the UK government pledged £6bn of new funding for the NHS, and the impact this funding and investment could have if executed properly, could revolutionise the UK public healthcare sector.

The NHS has always been a leader in terms of technology for medical purposes but where it has fallen down is in the streamlining of patient data, information and needs, which can lead to a breakdown in trust and the faith that the healthcare system is not a robust one. Therefore, the primary objective of additional funding must be to implement advanced data and digital technologies, to improve the digital health of the NHS and the overall health of the UK population, as well as revitalise both management efficiency and working practices.

Providing digital care

Digitalisation falls into two categories when it comes to the NHS – digitising traditionally ‘physical’ services like offering remote appointments and keeping electronic paper records, and a greater reliance on more innovative approaches driven by advances in technology. It is common knowledge that electronic services differ in GP practices across the country; and to have a drastically good or bad experience which is solely dependent on a geographical lottery contradicts the very purpose of offering an overarching healthcare provision to society at large.

By streamlining services and investing in proper infrastructure, a level playing field can be created which is vital when it comes to patients accessing both the care they need and their own personal history of appointments, GP interactions, diagnoses and medications. Through this approach, the NHS focus on creating world-leading care, provision of that care and potentially see waiting lists decrease due to the effective diagnosis and management enabled by slick and efficient technology.

This is especially important when looking at personalisedhealth support and developing a system that enables patients to receive care wherever they are and helps them monitor and manage long-term health conditions independently. This, alongside ensuring that technology and data collection supports improvements in both individual and population-level patient care, can only serve to streamline NHS efforts and create positive outcomes for both the patient and workforce.

Revolutionising patient experiences

A robust level of trust is critical to guaranteeing the success of any business or provision. If technology fails, so does the faith the customer or consumer has in the technology being designed to improve outcomes for them. An individual will always have some semblance of responsibility and ownership over their lives, well-being and health. Still, all of these key pillars can only stand strong when there is infrastructure in place to help drive positive results. Whilst there may be risks of excluding some groups of individuals with a digital-first approach, technology solutions can empower people to take control of their healthcare enabling the patient and NHS to work together. Tandem efforts between humans and technology

Technology must work in tandem with a workforce for it to be effective. This means the NHS workforce must be digitally savvy and have patient-centred care at the front and centre of all operations. Alongside any digital transformation the NHS adopts to improve patient outcomes, comes the need to assess current and future capability and capacity challenges, and build a workforce with the right skills to help shape an NHS that is fit for purpose.

This is just the beginning. With more invtesement and funding being allocated for the NHS this is the starting point, but for NHS decision-makers to ensure real benefits for patients, more still needs to be done. Effective digital evolution holds the key. Once the NHS has fully harnessed the poer of new and evolving technologies to change patient experiences throught the UK, with consistent communication and care, this will set the UK apart and will mark the NHS has a diriving example for accessible, digital healthcare.

Author: Edward Funnekotter, Chief Architect and AI Officer at Solace

From the development of new products and services, to the establishment of competitive advantages, Artificial intelligence (AI) can fundamentally reshape business operations across industries. However, each organisation is unique and as such navigating the complexities of AI, while applying the technology in an efficient and effective way, can be a challenge.

To unlock the transformational potential of AI in 2024 and integrate it into business operations in a seamless and productive way, organisations should seek to follow these five essential steps:

• Prioritise Data Quality and Quantity

Usefulness of AI models is directly correlated to the quantity and quality of the data used to train them, necessitating effective integration solutions and strong data governance practices. Organisations should seek to implement tools that provide a wealth of clean, accessible and high-quality data that can power quality AI.

Equally, AI systems cannot be effective if an organisation has data silos. These impede the ability for AI to digest meaningful data, and then provide the insights that are needed to drive business transformation. Breaking down data silos needs to be a business priority – with investment in effective data management, and an application of effective data integration solutions.

• Develop your own unique AI platform

The development of AI applications can be a laborious process, impacting the value that businesses are gaining from them in the immediate term. This can be expedited by platform engineering, which modernises enterprise software delivery to facilitate digital transformation, optimising developer experience and accelerating the ability to deliver customer value for product teams. The use of platform engineering offers developers pre-configured tools, pre-built components and automated infrastructure management, freeing them up to tackle their main objective; building innovative AI solutions faster.

While the development of AI applications that can help streamline infrastructure, automate tasks, and provide pre-built components for developers is the end goal, it’s only possible if the ability to design and develop is there in the first place. Gartner’s prediction that Platform Engineering will come of age in 2024 is a particularly promising update.

• Put business objectives at the heart of AI adoption – can AI deliver?

Any significant business change needs to be managed strategically, and with a clear indication of the aims and benefits they will bring. While a degree of experimentation is always necessary to drive business growth, these shouldn’t be at the expense of operational efficiency.

Before onboarding AI technologies, look internally at the key challenges that your business is facing and question “how can AI help to address this?” You may wish to enhance the customer experience, streamline internal processes or use AI systems to optimise internal decision-making. Be sure the application of AI is going to help, not hinder you on this journey

Also remember that AI remains in its infancy, and cannot be relied upon as a silver bullet for all operational challenges. Aim to build a sufficient base knowledge of AI capabilities today, and ensure these are contextualised within your own business requirements. This ensures that AI investments aren’t made prematurely, providing an unnecessary cost.

4. Don’t be limited by legacy systems

Owing to the complex mix of legacy and/or siloed systems that organisations employ, they may be restricted in their ability to use real-time and AI-driven operations to drive business value. For example, IDC found that only 12% of organisations connect customer data across departments.

Amidst the ‘AI data rush’ there will be a greater need for event-driven integration, however, only an enterprise architecture pattern will ensure new and legacy systems are able to work in tandem. Without this, organisations will be prevented from offering seamless, real-time digital experiences, linking events across departments, locations, on-premises systems, IoT devices, in a cloud or even multi-cloud environment.

• Leverage real-time technology

Keeping up with the real-time demands of AI can pose a challenge for legacy data architectures used by many organisations. Event mesh technology – an approach to distributed networks that enable real-time data sharing and processing – is a proven way of reducing these issues. By applying event-driven architecture (EDA), organisations can unlock the potential of real-time AI, with automated actions and informed decision making using relevant insights and automated actions.

By applying AI in this way, businesses can offer stronger, more personalised experiences – including the delivery of specialised offers, real-time recommendations and tailored support based on customer requirements. An example of this is in predictive maintenance, in which AI is able to analyse and anticipate future problems or business-critical failures, ahead of them affecting operations, and dedicate the correct resources to fix the issue, immediately. By implementing EDA as a ‘central nervous system’ for your data, not only is real-time AI possible, but adding new AI agents becomes significantly easier.

Ultimately, AI adoption needs to be strategic, avoiding chasing trends and focusing instead on how and where the technology can deliver true business value. Following the steps above, organisations can ensure they are leveraging the full transformative benefit of AI and driving business efficiency and growth in a data driven era.

AI can be a highly effective tool. However, its success is dependent on how it is being applied by organisations, strategically,  to meet clearly defined and specific business goals.