8. #BrightonFuse
This is where it started…
Creative + Digital + IT = CDIT
Arts + Humanities + Design + Digital Technology
9. #BrightonFuse
“It's in Apple's DNA that
technology alone is not enough —
it's technology married with
liberal arts, married with the
humanities, that yields us the
result that makes our heart sing”.
Steve Jobs
10. #BrightonFuse
The Brighton Fuse research
looks at the scale of this CDIT
sector in Brighton and the
impact and interplay of talent,
businesses and cluster
11. #BrightonFuse
The Method
7,500+ businesses individually reviewed
1,495 indentified as being part of the cluster
32.4% response rate to detailed questionnaire
75+ in depth follow up interviews
Our research…
12. #BrightonFuse
What is the CDIT sector worth?
0
100
200
300
400
500
600
700
800
900
1000
Universities Visitor
Economy
Nighttime
economy
CDIT
£
M
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£713m
14. #BrightonFuse
4x Brighton & Hove’s overall economy
2x as fast as same sectors in rest of South East England
10x UK’s overall economy
Jobs Growth
in Brighton’s CDIT sector
15. #BrightonFuse
“ I thought, seven years at [a London IT services
company], going back to start a business in Brighton,
I’ll clean up! I’ll have people begging me to work for
them.
I knew there would be a lot of people doing digital
stuff in Brighton but I just didn’t think the
competition would be particularly hot.
And I found out very quickly within about two or
three weeks that Brighton actually had some really
good established businesses that were doing world-
leading stuff.”
17. #BrightonFuse
It’s the place, stupid
Brighton is “great weekends...a city of
creative people, whether its journalists,
musicians or artists; the Brighton Festival,
the slightly alternative and bohemian
aspect to the brand”
18. #BrightonFuse
“Lifestyle was a part of it. I think I’d just had
enough of London really. I liked the idea of
being able to walk to work, a short-ride to
work, and just work-life balance was really up
there.
But also I’d noticed that there were more
professional companies here. The perception
I’d had ten, twelve years ago was that it was
guy’s in their bedroom; whereas when I moved
here four, five years ago there was a lot more
serious companies coming up.”
20. #BrightonFuse
Unfused Only focus on either creative
content or technology
Fused Bring together creative content
and technology
Superfused
Creative content combined with
technology is the core of their value
proposition
3 categories of CDIT business
21. #BrightonFuse
“Our development environment means that …if
an artist changes a graphic it’s immediately
reflected in the build that the developer’s doing
through a conversion system, so it’s very kind of
closely integrated… everyone’s mixed up...
We’ve never really wanted to pursue a
‘developers on one floor and artists on another’
model, Our projects are very creative, but that
creativity is always under-pinned by technology
and we have to evolve the creative vision side by
side with what the tech will do.”
Juliet Tzbar, Plug-in Media
22. #BrightonFuse
Growth rates by fusion
7.0%
17.9%
20.8%
14.7%
-1.2%
3.8%
8.8%
3.8%
-5% 0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25%
Unfused
Fused
Superfused
Total
Average growth Median growth
23. #BrightonFuse
“Tech …designer …host, they’re all part of an
ecosystem... if your target is to entice your
consumer to do something or to give them a
great user experience, or whatever it might
be, any one of those technological or design
things can be the hole in the boat that makes
it sink.
Covering the bases of all of those things, (has)
helped us grow quite quickly.”
Mike Hollingbery, BozBoz
25. #BrightonFuse
Brighton’s Talent Economy
“We give people time to
experiment together, to
fiddle about”
“…We invite
inspirational and
motivational peers in to
give talks”
“Staff are regularly given
time on specifically to
discuss with the team
something interesting or
relevant they have read”
“We have 3d printers and
stuff for people to play
around with”
“Our studio and the way it
looks and feels helps to
define who we are...”
30. #BrightonFuse
…But they are far less
successful at capturing value
Only 1% of businesses registered IP during the
previous 12 months
50% of businesses appear to be producing
materials eligible for copyright, but only 8% have
royalties as a source of revenue
32. #BrightonFuse
Delivers significant value to the local economy
Is driven by SuperFused businesses which are:
– Very fast growing
– More likely to be innovating with products and
services, markets and methods
– More likely to emphasise a company culture
designed to attract, nurture and grow its talent
– More likely to network
Brighton’s CDIT cluster...
Is growing rapidly
35. #BrightonFuse
“Our new office in Manhattan is
cheaper
than our Brighton HQ
– in the centre of Manhattan!”
“How can we seriously
call ourselves a digital cluster
with such cr*p broadband?
Its better at home than at
work.”
“we need to re-think our
education system so that it meets
the needs of our society and our
businesses as they are now, not
how they were”
Jenni Lloyd, Nixon McInnnes