The Black Country Business Festival is an annual, ten-day celebration which aims to boost business, stimulate innovation and shine a spotlight on business our region. The 2021 festival runs from Monday 4 to Friday 15 October and will include over one hundred free events, staged by local businesses across Sandwell, Dudley, Walsall and Wolverhampton.

Sandwell Council via Think Sandwell will be hosting four events this year, addressing the festival’s core themes of inclusive growth, innovation, business growth, regeneration and ‘this is the Black Country’. At 2.30pm on Wednesday 13 October, our colleagues in  Regeneration Planning will outline how Sandwell Council is working together with Birmingham City Council and a variety of other agencies and stakeholders, to create a ‘corridor’ of regeneration and investment between Smethwick and Birmingham City Hospital.

Plans include addressing the area’s historic importance, as well as forward-looking investment in housing, jobs and education. The flagship Midland Metropolitan University Hospital also plays a key role in driving the vision of a new ‘healthy community’. The event will give an opportunity to see the proposals that are being put forward, and to hear how the various organisations, such as the Canal & River Trust, Homes England, Sandwell and West Birmingham Hospitals NHS Trust and the WMCA, have been working together to create a collaborative masterplan.

To find out more, and to register your place, visit the event website. The other three events hosted by Think Sandwell are about the Towns Fund redevelopment plans, the Sandwell Inclusive Recovery Plan and the Sandwell Aquatics Centre. All are taking place online and are totally free for anyone to attend.