Greater Manchester, West Midlands and Glasgow City Region backed with £50m every to help native innovation priorities, plus £30m life sci investment unlocked
- Greater Manchester, West Midlands and Glasgow City Region backed to the tune of £50m every to help native innovation priorities from life-saving medicines to wash fuels that may lower payments
- Further life sciences investment in state-of-the-art West Midlands services to create jobs and boost Britain’s well being resilience, with worthwhile medicines made on house shores
- Comes forward of Chancellor’s landmark Regional Investment Summit bringing companies and governments collectively to turbocharge our economic system as a part of our Plan for Change.
New cash boosts of £20m every for Greater Manchester, West Midlands and Glasgow City Region will assist to ship extra of the regions’ game-changing native improvements like robotics to unlock new medicines or AI that may spot sicknesses earlier, the Science and Technology Secretary introduced yesterday (Sunday 19 October), forward of this Tuesday’s landmark Regional Investment Summit in Birmingham.
The funding package deal will give native leaders in these three areas entry to a complete of £50m every to fund improvements in science and expertise of their native areas, like the following lifesaving medication or cheaper fuels that may maintain payments down.
The new funding for three regions is the most recent dedication from the Government’s £500m Local Innovation Partnerships Fund (LIPF) and builds on the initial £30m earmarked for each place in June’s Spending Review, together with seven others throughout the UK, together with Cardiff City Region, Belfast-Derry/Londonderry and West Yorkshire.
We are additionally inviting additional bids of as much as £20 million from excessive potential innovation clusters in all different regions of the UK. This will help native leaders to spend money on native innovation strengths – from superior manufacturing and life sciences to digital applied sciences and clear power – and in flip again our Industrial Strategy to boost jobs.
Taken collectively, this month’s bumper LIPF funding package deal will again groups throughout the nation to scale-up and drive ahead extra discoveries, recognising the advantages they create to folks’s on a regular basis lives – from protecting us wholesome, to decreasing delays on our commute, to constructing a greener planet with cheaper payments.
This further funding will allow extra spinouts like Chemify in Glasgow, which was backed by Government funding, to assist create the world’s first ‘Chemputation’ facility – merging AI-powered molecular‑design engines with industrial robotics to hurry up discovery of medicines and supplies.
Elsewhere, regional funding has boosted Greater Manchester’s growth into a worldwide AI hub, connecting college technical experience to start-ups and SMEs to allow them to flip early-stage concepts into viable merchandise – from tech which might predict illness development earlier to work on web zero improvements to decarbonise buildings.
And within the West Midlands, the extra funding may allow extra tasks like Biochar CleanTech, taking natural residues like sawdust or fallen timber and changing them into usable low‑carbon merchandise.
The tasks launched underneath the predecessor Innovation Accelerators programme has delivered greater than £140 million of personal investment and lots of of jobs, creating extra alternatives for folks to get on.
This comes forward of the Regional Investment Summit which can carry collectively enterprise leaders, main buyers, policymakers, regulators, regional mayors and different native leaders to showcase the breadth and depth of alternatives to speculate, develop and create jobs proper throughout our nations and regions.
Ahead of the Summit, the Chancellor has pledged that no area will probably be locked out of the investment, jobs and growth being delivered as a part of the federal government’s Plan for Change.
Science and Technology Secretary Liz Kendall mentioned:
The UK is blessed with unimaginable science and tech expertise behind every little thing from life-saving vaccines to cleaner fuels that would lower payments within the years to come back, bettering the lives of individuals up and down the nation.
These prized sectors are additionally main drivers of financial growth in native communities. By backing these with the data to house in on native strengths and supporting valued companies in constructing the services that may set our nation aside, we will lead the following technology of life-changing discoveries.
This Government’s message forward of this landmark Regional Investment Summit is loud and clear – the UK is open for enterprise.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves mentioned:
The world’s brightest abilities and most modern companies might be present in each nook of the UK, however years of continual underinvestment have held them again.
Not anymore. We are placing a cease to this unfairness by investing in each a part of the nation. From Glasgow to Birmingham, we’re fuelling innovation by way of our Plan for Change, delivering expert jobs, and constructing an economic system that works for, and rewards working folks.
Mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham, mentioned:
Greater Manchester has an intensive innovation ecosystem, with excellent sector strengths in areas like superior supplies, life sciences and AI, and world-leading corporations, universities and analysis establishments. This further funding is a welcome boost that may assist us unlock the potential of our growth-driving sectors and construct on our excellent productiveness growth in recent times.
In piloting the Innovation Accelerator we had been in a position to make use of native data and understanding to translate analysis and growth funding into enterprise growth, new jobs and personal sector investment. We stay up for utilizing the Local Innovation Partnerships Fund to make an excellent greater affect.
To additional help modern growth within the regions, the Government can be asserting the primary two investments to be delivered by way of spherical one of many Life Sciences Innovative Manufacturing Fund (LSIMF), which is about to unlock over £30 million in joint public-private investment.
Medicines producer Sterling Pharmaceuticals is investing in a 60,000 sq ft state-of-the-art new manufacturing and R&D centre in Birmingham. Medtech firm Biocomposites, in the meantime, is bringing ahead a new manufacturing facility at Keele. Besides creating and safeguarding dozens of high-skilled jobs, these services will be sure that worthwhile medicines are made right here within the UK, bolstering the nation’s resilience to well being emergencies.
Backed by main companies together with Eon, Lloyds, KPMG, HSBC and IBM, the Regional Investment Summit will probably be co-hosted by the Chancellor, the Business and Trade Secretary, and West Midlands Mayor Richard Parker, with enterprise leaders, worldwide buyers, and policymakers from house and overseas in attendance.
Notes to editors:
- The expression of interest for the competitors opened on 6 October, and UKRI revealed further guidance to assist potential candidates put together.
- Up to £520 million is being made accessible by way of LSIMF over the following 5 years, with additional investments to be introduced in the end.
- Ten regions across the UK have already acquired backing by way of the Local Innovation Partnerships Fund. These embody seven innovation hubs in England such as Greater Manchester, West Midlands, and West Yorkshire, alongside Glasgow City Region in Scotland, Cardiff Capital Region in Wales, and an innovation hall linking Belfast and Derry-Londonderry in Northern Ireland. Each of those areas has been earmarked for not less than £30 million to spend money on their regional innovation strengths.