Tyseley’s Climate Innovation Platform Brings Customer Evidence Into Focus

Birmingham’s Climate Innovation Platform is preparing to support a further 30 climate entrepreneurs over the next two years, backed by continued HSBC UK support and based at TEP Birmingham in Tyseley.

The headline numbers from the programme’s first five years are encouraging: more than 100 entrepreneurs supported, over £85m raised in public and private investment, more than 90 jobs created and over 15 patents filed. But the next phase poses a more revealing commercial question than the amount of capital attracted: can young climate businesses build sufficiently strong evidence that customers will adopt their products repeatedly?

That distinction matters because clean technology can appear investable well before it is genuinely easy to buy. A promising solution may perform in a demonstrator, attract grant backing and secure media attention, yet still struggle with procurement cycles, integration costs, operational disruption or unclear ownership of the buying decision.

From innovation support to a buying case

The platform is led by the University of Birmingham, delivered with Energy Systems Catapult and connected to facilities and workspace at TEP Birmingham. Its sixth cohort is expected to begin in early 2027, with selected businesses receiving business-development and incubation support, introductions to investors and supply-chain partners, and opportunities to develop market-entry demonstrators.

That last element is particularly important. A demonstrator should not simply prove that a technology functions. It should help a prospective buyer answer practical questions: which problem does this solve first; whose budget is affected; what changes for staff or customers; and how quickly can value be seen?

For many climate ventures, the most useful early evidence will be narrower than a large deployment. A well-defined pilot with a logistics operator, housing provider, manufacturer or energy user can reveal the operational conditions in which the offer works — and the points at which adoption stalls. That gives founders a more credible route to product development, positioning and pricing than a broad claim about market need.

The strongest climate-tech evidence is not interest in a solution, but a buyer’s willingness to repeat, expand or recommend it.

A regional asset with a practical advantage

Tyseley’s advantage is not merely that it provides a location for start-ups. The site brings businesses into contact with energy infrastructure, university expertise and other firms working on related problems. That can shorten the distance between an idea and a realistic test environment.

The programme’s earlier activity has covered areas including transport, housing, renewable energy and data. Such variety is useful only if it creates relevant routes to market rather than a loose collection of low-carbon propositions. Shared space and networking have value, but businesses ultimately need access to organisations with defined commercial or operational challenges.

The West Midlands has potential strengths here. Its manufacturing base, freight activity, dense urban areas and major institutions offer settings in which energy, mobility and resource-efficiency propositions can be tested against real constraints. For founders, those settings should be treated as research environments as much as showcase opportunities.

What the next cohort should measure

Investment, job creation and patents remain worthwhile indicators. They show whether an innovation ecosystem is generating activity and protecting intellectual property. Yet they cannot alone show whether a market is forming.

For the next cohort, stronger measures would include paid pilot conversions, repeat contracts, time from first conversation to deployment, evidence of reduced customer effort and the proportion of users who expand usage after an initial trial. Those measures would identify whether support is helping firms move from technical promise towards a repeatable commercial proposition.

Birmingham does not need every climate venture to remain local. It does, however, benefit when companies use the region to understand customers early, develop credible adoption evidence and build offers robust enough to travel. That is the harder work behind a durable clean-tech cluster.