Access to Finance Specialist in Newcastle upon Tyne

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Newcastle University is a great place to work, with excellent benefits . We have a generous holiday package; plus the opportunity to buy more, great pension schemes and a number of health and wellbeing initiatives to support you.

Closing Date: 09 October 2025

The Role

This is an exciting opportunity to take a leading role in SCENE, a Partnership a strategic commercial eco-system programme with Durham, Newcastle, Northumbria, Teesside and Sunderland universities. This is a sector leading partnership and you will provide expertise and leadership in all areas of access to finance for spin outs from Partner members, sourcing new opportunities for collaboration and growth aligned to our strategic aims. You will be responsible for leading the development, delivery and evaluation of access to finance activities as agreed by the Partnership including outreach interventions across the investment community here in the North East and beyond. You will also act as lead contact between the participating universities and the new £22.5m Spin Out and Commercialisation Fund.

The role will include strengthening the region’s connections with wider Uk and international investor networks; enhancing the capability of university TTOs to provide support to spinouts in developing compelling commercial investment propositions; providing a key point of co-ordination between the HEPs and the University Commercialisation Spinout Fund and developing long-term relationships with co-funders attracted to invest in the region’s high potential spinout businesses, maximising the Spinout Fund’s impact in the region.

Key Accountabilities

• Lead the ongoing development of access to finance for spin outs on behalf of our five regional universities. You will take oversight of the governance structures, partnership working and project reporting requirements. This will involve:
  • Providing strategic direction to the partnership by:
    • Overseeing the investment landscape and planning cycles, taking overall responsibility for investor engagement across the commercialisation ecosystem.
    • Overseeing a framework for monitoring progress against SCENE targets, alignment with Partners spin outs plans, including risk management;
    • Supporting the work of the Northern Accelerator, Investor Committee, University Tech Transfer Offices (TTOs) through timely and appropriate reporting, the preparation of documentation to support decision making and implementing recommendations;
    • Overseeing the requirements of business, investors, stakeholders and other indicators to develop targeting strategies as directed by SCENE;
    • Providing a framework for partners to agree a core set of interventions developed regionally and nationally to support spin outs to access funding;
    • Overseeing the appropriate financial monitoring systems and reporting to the Partnership;
    • Ensuring that the Partnership has effective collaboration and data sharing agreements in place and is compliant with GDPR.
  • Leading the SCENE team based at Newcastle to ensure that regional activity, project management, marketing and communications is effectively developed and delivered with an evidence-led approach.
  • Overseeing the implementation of robust evaluation and tracking processes to ensure SCENE is rigorously evaluated in order to monitor progress against targets and to give evidence-based recommendations for development and potential expansion.
  • Working with the TTO offices across the partnership, raise the profile of research commercialisation in the sector and represent the interests of the Partnership and its Partners at external meetings, round table discussions and conferences in order to maximise the profile of the project and disseminate good practice to the sector.
• Lead the 5 university’s relationship with the Commercialisation and Spin Out Fund. This will involve working closely with colleagues in enterprise teams engaged in fundraising activity, ensuring legal and data sharing compliance, providing regular reporting and raising the profile of the Fund with internal and external stakeholders.
• Provide professional support and expertise to the Spin out leads across the partnership and the wider SCENE team. in the development and delivery of the Universities strategies for fair access and widening participation. Contribute to the preparation of monitoring reports, case studies and good practice examples for external (angels, VCs partners and stakeholders) and internal (academics, business teams etc), audiences as required.
• Work with the Strategic Lead for SCENE to ensure join up with other high profile collaborative widening participation projects. Ensure that expertise and knowledge is shared across colleagues and work together to identify and implement economies of scale and shared working. Identify, scope and assess potential additional funding opportunities.
• Lead, motivate and champion colleagues working on spin out activity ensuring they are well supported to achieve their objectives and have timely and effective development reviews. Provide support for SCENE Project Coordinators to in turn effectively manage their KPIs.
• Work with partners, key stakeholders, commercial networks and university staff to ensure integration, alignment and added value of project activity with existing activity, and regional priorities.
• Maintain oversight of a robust approach to spin out access to finance for collaborative projects, aligning to Newcastle University policies and ensuring project staff undertake regular and appropriate training.

For Informal Enquires please contact Mr Rick McCordall : Rick.mccordall@newcastle.ac.uk

The Person (Essential)

Knowledge, Skills and Experience

• Authoritative knowledge and understanding of the issues, policies and complexities of spin outs and access to finance.
• Substantial experience of partnership working, managing potentially conflicting institutional priorities alongside funder requirements.
• Understand the spin out processes and life cycle including registration and factors affecting the choices and decision-making of funding plans for all spin outs across the partnership.
• Demonstrable experience of managing large and complex projects and overseeing their operational implementation and delivery.
• Experience of developing and implementing a monitoring and evaluation process to ensure impact and continuous improvement.
• Analytical skills to consider complex information and policy to inform effective, data-led project development.
• Experience of financial reporting and budget management.
• Ability to influence key external agencies and individuals to ensure strategic and operational alignment of activity.
• Experience of leading, managing and motivating a team.
• Well-developed planning and organisational skills
• Ability to work accurately with meticulous attention to detail.
• The ability to deal with complex and sensitive matters in a professional and effective manner.
• Customer service skills including the ability to negotiate and interact tactfully with a wide range of people.
• Excellent IT and digital skills
• Willingness to work some evenings and weekends and to travel throughout the region and nationally, as required

Attitudes and Behaviour

• Works effectively in a complex and dynamic operating environment.
• Motivates and inspires others and works effectively in a team or providing leadership.
• Thinks strategically, making sense of complex or conflicting data and different priorities of stakeholders.
• Builds relationships with key stakeholders and audiences internally and externally to gain support and can use a variety of influencing styles to suit the audience.
• When communicating, understands how best to appeal to another person or group and correctly finds the best way to approach a situation.

Qualifications

• Degree level qualification or substantial relevant experience.

Newcastle University is a global University where everyone is treated with dignity and respect. As a University of Sanctuary, we aim to provide a welcoming place of safety for all, offering opportunities to people fleeing violence and persecution.

We are committed to being a fully inclusive university which actively recruits, supports and retains colleagues from all sectors of society. We value diversity as well as celebrate, support and thrive on the contributions of all of our employees and the communities they represent. We are proud to be an equal opportunities employer and encourage applications from individuals who can complement our existing teams, we believe that success is built on having teams whose backgrounds and experiences reflect the diversity of our university and student population.

At Newcastle University we hold a goldAthena Swan award in recognition of our good employment practices for the advancement of gender equality. We also hold a Race Equality Charter Bronze award in recognition of our work towards tackling race inequality in higher education REC. We are a Disability Confident employer and will offer an interview to disabled applicants who meet the essential criteria for the role as part of the offer and interview scheme.

In addition, we are a member of the Euraxess initiative supporting researchers in Europe.