Biography

Colin Bell is a business growth and innovation specialist with over 20 years’ experience supporting small and medium-sized enterprises across the UK. He has also lived the entrepreneurial journey first-hand, having founded, scaled, and successfully exited businesses. This mix of direct experience and system-level expertise gives him a unique perspective on the challenges and opportunities facing entrepreneurs. He has held senior leadership roles in regional economic development, including Director of Business Growth, Innovation and Sector Development at the North East LEP and Head of Business Growth at the North East Combined Authority, and has contributed nationally to the UK Government’s Small Business Strategy and Business Growth Service, representing the Growth Hub network on ministerial taskforces.

As founder of Fellshore, Colin is passionate about bridging the gap between research, policy, and practice. His focus is on helping policymakers, researchers, and business leaders translate evidence into interventions that drive growth, resilience, and impact. He brings to the ERC Steering Group a blend of practitioner, policymaker, and entrepreneurial credibility, with a commitment to ensuring that world-class research informs actionable policy and practice that genuinely improves outcomes for small businesses and the communities they serve.