TWO Southampton inventors have scooped the top prize at the Business Link Wessex Innovation Awards 2003.

Business partners Neville Hutchinson, 66, and Marcus Lee, 49, won over £12,000 in the showpiece event held at INTECH in Winchester.

The pair have invented a new type of cement that could lower the cost of house-building in the future. They have been working together on the project since April 2002.

Mr Lee, an engineering professor at the University of Southampton, hailed the idea as the answer to housing prices in the region: "The south-east is the most expensive place to live in the country. It is getting to the stage where nurses, teachers and other low-paid workers that provide such an important service can no longer afford to live in the area," he said.

"This prototype has the potential to reduce the cost of building an average sized family home by up to £15,000."

The showpiece is held every year to let inventors illustrate their work to would-be investors.

Organiser John Stainer said: "Without this event these brilliant ideas would not find their way on to the market.

"Inventors often need financial assistance from investors and we provide them with the opportunity to obtain that," he said.