Lightox, Horizon: Therapeutic Microbubbles and StrataStem are among the companies that will receive support from the North of England Life Sciences Accelerator.

North of England Life Science Accelerator (Nelsa), a £500,000 ($650,000) program launched in September 2016 with the backing of several universities, has chosen eight companies to receive expert help with of becomnig ready for funding.

Four of the companies are life sciences spinouts, including Lightox, from Durham University, Horizon: Therapeutic Microbubbles, from University of Leeds, and StrataStem, from University of Manchester.

Newcastle University has also had an undisclosed business chosen, focused on “an integrated gastrointestinal model for drug delivery”.

The remaining companies are life sciences startups Mind Moose and MolMart as well as unnamed startup projects affiliated with University of Central Lancashire.

The companies will be given access to mentors, coaching and workshops, with the aim of helping the businesses reach the next phase of their growth and readying them for investment.

Sally Peyman from University of Leeds said: “The Nelsa process so far has proven extremely useful in helping us to think how best to take the technology from the lab and focus on understanding customer requirements to enable effective future development of the technology.

 “We are excited to enter the next phase of the Nelsa process to develop this opportunity further.”

– This article was amended to reflect that the companies have not received the capital yet. We apologise for the confusion.