"Many people within the healthcare sector will already be aware of the close and well-established partnership that exists between the School of Health Studies at Homerton and our own Institute of Health and Social Care. We see the transfer of this activity from Homerton as very much a way of fully capitalising on the potential, strengths and expertise of these two educational providers.

"What we want to do is to achieve growth, to enable diversification and to take full advantage of the many business and academic opportunities which we are identifying. The transfer of ownership provides an extremely good fit with our vision of enhancing the scope and continuously improving the quality of the University's health-related activities throughout the Eastern region and beyond. We already have substantial health service contracts in the Essex region and, with the support of the Workforce Development Confederation in Essex, we are about to invest in a new £8m Institute of Health and Social Care building on our Chelmsford site."

"The transfer of ownership reflected the University's commitment to improve the health and social care of individuals and communities in East Anglia, and more widely, through high quality education, research and consultancy."