Eastern Promise - The Podcast

Episode 122: Innovate Cambridge w. Kathryn Chapman & Michael Anstey

This Week: Eastern Promise takes a look at the exciting, inclusive and growing dynamo that is Innovate Cambridge!
Recorded at their HQ, The Glasshouse, in Botanic House on Hills Road in the city, Dr Kathryn Chapman, Executive Director, and Board Member Michael Anstey, chat with host of the Eastern Promise podcast, Mike Rigby, about the progress Innovate Cambridge has made thus far, the vision behind the initiative and more, including the Cambridge X Manchester partnership (of particular interest to our Mancunian Exec Producer!)  
But that's not all!  We take a meander around The Glasshouse with Innovate Cambridge's Ana Lucia Buckman, taking in the decor and finding out the thinking and feel behind the warm, welcoming design of this facility.
You can find out more about becoming a member of Innovate Cambridge by clicking here.
You can contact Eastern Promise at: podcast@easternpromise.org.uk or by visiting easternpromise.org.uk, where you can also hear previous episodes of the podcast...
Eastern Promise is proud to be sponsored by Mills & Reeve. 

CROWDSOURCERY! Hopes for 2025 & Your Questions Answered!

This Week: Yes! Deferred is not denied and postponed is not prevented, 'coz CrowdSourcery is back to work its magic once again! 
This time, we're looking at your hopes and dreams for 2025, with health, wealth and happiness featuring on your lists, in no particular order.  
BUT THAT'S NOT ALL...By no means, for CEO of Eastern Promise and Executive Producer of this Podcast answers YOUR questions, including: funniest guest, most moving story, impediments to progress, getting the East of England noticed!  His favourite coffee shops!  Mike answers them all... Thank you to everyone who sent in a question(s)!
To contact CrowdSourcery and/or Eastern Promise, you can email: crowdsourcery@easternpromise.org.uk or podcast@easternpromise.org.uk.
Eastern Promise is proud to be supported by Mills & Reeve. 

Episode 121: ARU Peterborough

This Week: ARU Peterborough is the East of England's newest higher education provider, created for a specific set of socio-economic purposes by the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority, Peterborough City Council and Anglia Ruskin University.
ARU Peterborough is addressing the skills shortage that threatens an otherwise strongly performing economy, limiting local firms and giving incoming businesses pause.  
Host and Executive Producer Mike Rigby is joined by the inaugural (and current) Principal, Professor Ross Renton, and Chair of the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Business Board, Al Kingsley MBE, to discuss the genesis of the campus, the awards for social mobility, its importance to the region and its steps towards becoming a standalone institution in 2023.
You can contact the Eastern Promise podcast team by emailing: podcast@easternrpomise.org.uk.
For more information on ARU Peterborough, click here.
To hear other episodes of the Eastern Promise podcast, click here.
Eastern Promise is proud to be supported by Mills & Reeve.

Episode 120: Cambs & Peterborough in Parliament PLUS Brecks-Cambridge Housing Roundtable (Part 2)

This Week: You join me in the Mother of Parliaments as a guest of Andrew Pakes, MP for Peterborough; North West Cambridgeshire MP Sam Carling; and the Cambridgeshire & Peterborough Combined Authority and Mayor Dr Nik Johnson.  
I chat with Nik about the message behind the event; that Cambridgeshire and Peterborough stand ready to provide the growth that the UK needs.  We also discuss his role as the East of England's ONLY metro mayor and we hear comments to the assembled from Local Growth Minister Alex Morris MP.  But that's not even half of what this episode has for you...
We bring you part two of our panel on 'How the Brecks can Support the Growth of Cambridge', looking specifically at housing, community and placemaking.  
The Brecks area of Norfolk straddles the A11 and Cambridge railway line, and sits roughly equidistant between Cambridge and Norwich.  
How the area might relieve the housing pressure on Cambridge for he benefit of all, and do so in a carefully created community is discussed by an all-star panel.  
Joining host Mike Rigby from Breckland Council are Councillor Sarah Suggitt, Cabinet Member for housing and planning at along with Strategic Growth Manager Stephen Scowen.  From Thetford Town Council we have independent Deputy Mayor Carla Barreto; Community engagement expert and CEO of Socially Adept, Esmee Wilcox; Feilden and Mawson architect and champion of arboreal living Matt Wood; and Mills & Reeve’s own, Stewardship and development specialist Anna Aldous.
 
You can hear the first part of the roundtable here: https://easternpromise.podbean.com/e/episode-120-cambs-peterborough-in-parliament-plus-brecks-cambridge-housing-roundtable-part-2/
 
For more information on the New Town 'sandbox', email podcast@easternpromise.org.uk, putting 'sandbox' in the subject line.
Find out more about Breckland Council's growth and development plans here.
Eastern Promise is proud to be supported by Mills & Reeve.
For more information, and to hear all previous editions of the podcast, visit easternpromise.org.uk.  

Episode 119: How the Brecks can Support the Housing Needs of Cambridge (Part 1)

This Week: We return to our series on 'How the Brecks can Support the Growth of Cambridge'.  
The Brecks area of Norfolk straddles the A11 and Cambridge railway line, and sits roughly equidistant between Cambridge and Norwich.  
How the area might relieve the housing pressure on Cambridge for he benefit of all, and do so in a carefully created community is discussed by an all-star panel.  
Joining host Mike Rigby from Breckland Council are Councillor Sarah Suggitt, Cabinet Member for housing and planning at along with Strategic Growth Manager Stephen Scowen.  From Thetford Town Council we have independent Deputy Mayor Carla Barreto; Community engagement expert and CEO of Socially Adept, Esmee Wilcox; Feilden and Mawson architect and champion of arboreal living Matt Wood; and Mills & Reeve’s own, Stewardship and development specialist Anna Aldous.
For more information on the New Town 'sandbox', email podcast@easternpromise.org.uk, putting 'sandbox' in the subject line.
Find out more about Breckland Council's growth and development plans here.
Eastern Promise is proud to be supported by Mills & Reeve.
For more information, and to hear all previous editions of the podcast, visit easternpromise.org.uk.  

Episode 118: The CPCA Social Impact Investment Fund

This Week: We look at the £2.4m of fresh support for social enterprises in the Cambridgeshire & Peterborough Combined Authority (CPCA) area, bridging the gap between those organisations looking to put people and place before profit and traditional forms of finance.  
Chair of the CPCA Business Board, Al Kingsley MBE, Gary Parker of the FSE Group, and Iain Crighton MBE FIMI of Allia join your host, Mike Rigby, in Huntingdon to hear stories of social enterprises being supported and the nuts & bolts of how the scheme works in practice.  
For more details, visit:
https://cambridgeshirepeterborough-ca.gov.uk/what-we-deliver/business/business-growth-service/ (Cambridgeshire & Peterborough Combined Authority); 
https://futurebusinesscentre.co.uk/programmes/cpca-social-impact-investment-fund/ (Allia)
https://www.thefsegroup.com/fund/cpca-business-growth-and-social-impact-investment-fund (The FSE Group).
You can contact Eastern Promise by visiting our website or emailing podcast@easternpromise.org.uk.
Eastern Promise is proud to be supported by Mills & Reeve.
 
 

Episode 117: Anglia Capital Group & The Halo Programme (with PfBIO)

This week: Welcome to the first Eastern Promise podcase of 2025!  And what a belter it is...Anglia Capital Group MD Hannah Brynn joins me to discuss 'The Halo Programme', which readies participants to work with angel investors.  Hannah shares the way the programme works and we'll also hear from 2023 Halo Programme alum, Dr |Rosaria Campilongo of PfBIO on the difference the programme made to her.  But that's not all!  You can also hear an EXCLUSIVE sneak preview of the first few months of 2025's Eastern Promise goodness!  For more information on the Halo Programme and Anglia Capital Group, click here.Intrigued by PfBIO?  Then click here.To drop Eastern Promise a line, email podcast@easternpromise.org.uk.
You can visit the Eastern Promise website here.Eastern Promise is proud to be supported by Mills & Reeve.  Achieving more, together.

Episode 116: Nick Steven Jones, CEO Jarrold Group

This Week: In our last show of 2024, Mike Rigby chats to Nick Steven-Jones, Chief Executive of the Jarrold Group, which includes logistics, facilities management and training companies as well as the iconic Jarrolds department store in central Norwich.
We'll hear from Nick: how his career path's taken him through some of Norfolk's biggest names; what it means to have a 250-year old independent, family-run store under his watchful gaze; the brand evolution working with The Cl!ck; and also his chairmanship of the Norfolk Business Board.  
Get in touch by emailing us at: podcast@easternpromise.org.uk and find out more about Eastern Promise by going to easternpromise.org.uk.  
You can visit the Jarrold Group website here.
More details about the Norfolk Business Board are available here.
Eastern Promise is proud to be supported by Mills & Reeve.

CROWDSOURCERY! Tall Tales...

This Week: We're so pleased so many of you Love the CrowdSourcery feature (no, really; the data says so) and this time you've outdone yourselves, sharing your tallest tales, strangest stories and craziest chronicles from across the East of England, and here they are, recounted by a man who can't even act his age.
So prepare to...COWER from the wrath of the Ludham Wyrm!RECOIL at the expectorating antics of Cambridge's ghostly airman! FLEE as the Fen Tiger strikes!And more stories from local legends given a halloween spin!
Look out for our next call for some CrowdSourcery on LinkedIn and listen to more instalments at https://easternpromise.org.uk.
Eastern Promise is proud to be sponsored by Mills & Reeve.
  

Episode 115 : EdiForm - Fighting Dementia with 3D-Printed Food

This Week: Your host, Mike Rigby, chats with EdiForm founders John Farley and Prof. Sheng Qi about their revolutionary approach to dementia care: using specialised 3D printers to deliver more nutritious, palatable food - a huge leap forward in material science spinning out from the University of East Anglia.  We also share news of Newmarket's 'Presents Galore' festive shopping experience this coming weekend (29/11/24 - 1/12/24).
Find out more about EdiForm here, and click here to visit the Eastern Promise website.  To contact the show, simply  write to podcast@easternpromise.org.uk/.
Eastern Promise is proud to be supported by Mills & Reeve.