We are kicking off 2026 with fresh ideas, new opportunities and a calendar of events designed to inspire innovation and collaboration.
In this month’s issue, we take a look at some of the activities planned for the year ahead and celebrate you, our amazing community, who have helped us to achieve some incredible milestones so far.
Thanks to your engagement and support we have grown our Community of Practice to more than 250 members, awarded our first round of grant funding to a number of projects (details available soon), built strong industry-academia collaborations, delivered a range of business support and run a series of successful events across our partner hubs.
Looking ahead, we are aiming even higher! Here are some of the key events coming up this year:
- 10th March 2026: Join us for our Optics and Photonics Workshop (Canterbury, Kent) bringing together inter-disciplinary clinicians, researchers and industry groups to look at the next generation of optical imaging and sensing tools and their applications.
- June 2026: Femtech and Diagnostics Workshop, in collaboration with Lucy Lehane (Date TBC). Help shape this event! If you would like to speak at this workshop, have ideas, topics you would like to see covered or just want to register an initial interest, we would love to hear from you!
- 15th September 2026: CADDA Annual Conference (Manchester) Don’t miss our flagship event! Join us in-person to learn from and share insights with peers and sector experts. Details coming soon.
- CADDA Café visits: Learn how to access our grant funding and other business support. If you would be interested in arranging a visit from us, please Get in touch
- Grant Funding: We will open our next round of CADDA knowledge transfer vouchers grant funding in the first half of 2026. Details will be made available on our website, on LinkedIn and to our Community of Practice very soon.
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Further workshops are also in development for this year. Please contact us if you would like to suggest a workshop topic for us to consider.
Lastly, I would like to take a moment to personally welcome our new Project Director, Dr. Paul Meakin, who joins us at CADDA this month. Paul brings a wealth of experience in the industry and in diagnostics product development, and we are delighted to have him join us. Look out for a full feature in next month’s issue.
Wishing you all a very Happy New Year!