Business and Intellectual Property Centre

Located in Sheffield Central Library, the Business and Intellectual Property Centre (BIPC) offers insights and access to free resources, training, and events. We’ll help you imagine, start, or develop your business. Whether you’re just setting out, need advice on protecting your intellectual property, or simply have a brilliant idea you want to discuss, we’re here to guide you.

It is free to join and open to everyone.

Resources available at the BIPC

A range of resources are available including:

• Intellectual Property (IP) and business information advice one-to-ones
• IP, business legal and accountancy clinics
• market research and business information database access
• Intellectual Property information – member of the UK Patlib Network, providing local access to patent and IP information and GB historical patents from 1617 to 1900

Visit the Business and IP Centre South Yorkshire website to find out more about our databases, get clued up on Intellectual Property, book on to workshops and events, and access resources and toolkits to help your business journey.

Since 2020, we have partnered with Barnsley Metropolitan Borough Council, Doncaster Council and Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council to provide support across the entire region, as BIPC South Yorkshire.

The centre was first opened in Sheffield in 2015 and within the first three years helped to create almost 400 business, 320 additional jobs and generated £2.8m Gross Value Added (GVA) for the region. Working directly with the British Library since then, the BIPC National Network has supported the creation of over 12,000 new businesses, led to the creation of over 7,800 new jobs and generated an extra £78million GVA to the UK economy.