Bristol’s hi-tech innovators are being urged to enter an awards scheme that aims to find the best tech firms in the West.
The SPARKies will showcase the leading people, products and companies that make up the tech industry across a region spreading from Swindon to Bath, Bristol and Gloucestershire. 
Due to rising interest in the awards, now in their third year, the number of categories has been expanded to a record 14, including ‘Best App’, ‘Best Start-up’, ‘Biggest Success Story’, ‘Start-up To Watch’ and the heralded ‘Founder / Entrepreneur Of The Year’. Nominations are now open and close on October 3.
SPARKies founder David Maher Roberts, who is also creative and digital media sector specialist for inward investment agency Invest Bristol & Bath, said: “Shadowing the growth of the digital economy in the region, the SPARKies is going from strength to strength.
“When we first launched the awards in 2012, we had 100 nominations and 250 people attended the awards night – two years on and we’re expecting hundreds of nominations and we have had to increase the venue capacity to over 400 for the event.”
The increase in prominence of the Bristol and Bath tech cluster and the growing stature of the awards event have combined to attract much greater support from businesses across the UK.
The region’s tech sector includes more than1,300 companies, employing around 30,000 people, contributing an estimated £4.8b to national economy.
International consultancy McKinsey earlier this year identified the Bristol and Bath tech cluster as experiencing the fastest ‘internationally-significant’ growth outside London while a report from Nesta, the UK’s leading independent think tank on innovation, named Bristol and Bath as two out of the nine creative hotspots in the UK.
Also four of the eight SMEs chosen to take part in a recent Government-sponsored robotics trade mission to California were from the Bristol and Bath region. The Bristol Robotics Laboratory at UWE is one of Europe’s largest robotics labs, while the Bristol Games Hub in Stokes Croft is the largest independent co-working hub for games developers in the world.
Nick Sturge, director of the Engine Shed innovation hub and the Bristol SETsquared Centre, and one of the 30 judges, said: “The region’s digital economy has been steadily growing, minding its own business and largely ignored by the rest of the UK.
“But now our profile has stepped up massively to the point that we’re seen as a leader – an exemplar of how to grow a tech-based cluster.
“As a judge I’m hoping to see some great, ambitious companies that are truly innovative and keen to scale. I hope there will be some established companies we have never heard of that realise the value of being a part of the local eco-system, even if their business is 100% export.”
Sponsors of the SPARKies include international management consultants Deloitte Digital, crowd-funding startup CrowdBnk and Peter Gabriel’s music label Real World.
The winners will be announced and celebrated at an awards ceremony on October 30 at Komedia in Bath.
