Three collaborations between University of Bristol researchers and creative businesses have received funding to take their ground-breaking ideas to market.
Stand + Stare, Bristol-based creators of immersive theatre and interactive design, in collaboration with Prof Tim Cole of the Department of History, have created the Mayfly Sound Journal, a place to store precious memories of travel with an accompanying iPhone app to make sound recordings and tag them to the pages. 
Digital agency Aerian, based in Box, near Bath, is collaborating with Jo Elsworth from the university’s Theatre Collection on Naked Objects, a project which aims to develop intelligent software for museums to enhance user engagement with objects.
For the Quipu project, London media production company Chaka Studio in collaboration with Dr Matthew Brown of the School of Modern Languages is pioneering a unique method for online participation and civic engagement: an interactive phone line directly linked to a live website.
The money has come from REACT, an Arts and Humanities Research Council-funded knowledge exchange hub.
REACT executive producer Clare Reddington said: “As REACT enters its final year we are delighted to be able to award some of our flagship projects additional support to help them move towards sustainability and growth as well as help them understand how collaborations between arts and humanities research and the creative economy can scale and achieve commercial success.
“This is a unique and bespoke programme designed to help our projects fly. It will support our teams to go beyond prototype and get their products into the hands of users.”
The REACT Alumni Scheme is being delivered by two incubator partners, Station 12 and Upstarter, who will work together with the companies and academics and bring in developers and specialists needed to create a market ready product.
Both Upstarter and Station 12 have extensive experience in developing and scaling businesses and will deliver a programme blending individual meetings, group workshops and consultancy and services, tailored to the needs of each project. Needs could include marketing strategy, product market fit, investment readiness, go to market strategy, seeking potential partners, strategic direction, proposition prototyping, user centred design, investment readiness, legal advice and support with company structure and governance.
