Raising regional innovation investment could boost ‘levelling up’, as pressure grows on No. 10 hopefuls Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss to commit to the flagship policy.
A report has highlighted the opportunity for ‘levelling up’ funding from Innovate UK to fuel regional growth. It has led to calls for more ammunition for ‘the UK’s national innovation agency’, so it can drive the economic policy forward in regions with a history of inadequate innovation funding.
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The data reveals that 64% of Innovate UK funding has been awarded to commercial entities operating in the four southern regions, including the East of England. When the West Midlands is included, this figure increases to 72%)of funding, leaving only around a quarter (28%) of funding for the rest of the UK.
Performance
Companies in London have claimed £1.43 billion (24%) of the total funding, followed closely by those in the South East with £1.06 billion (18%). The South West comes in third, with £647 million (11%) of the total funding.
The findings are part of ‘Innovate UK: the impact Report’, created by intellectual property services and R&D tax credit experts GovGrant. The report reveals the performance of 18 years of Innovate UK investments, with successful applications for commercial entities totaling £5.9 billion in funding, from 29,336 successful applications.
Innovate UK funding has the greatest impact outside the South
Four measures
Using four measures of positive impact, GovGrant found that regions away from the South are most likely to see a positive effect from funding, comparing pre and post-Innovate UK investment:
Highest share of companies with a positive employee impact— North East
Highest share of companies with a positive net worth impact — Yorkshire and The Humber
Highest share of companies with a positive turnover impact — East Midlands
Highest share of companies with a positive tax impact — Wales
A recent poll from Public First that found Conservative voters overwhelmingly supported continuing the levelling up policy. Commenting on this, Former Minister for Levelling Up Neil O’Brien said that changes ‘from infrastructure to innovation investment’ were needed to drive regional growth, in addition to the tax incentives currently being debated by Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss.
Luke Hamm, CEO at GovGrant, said: “It’s been immensely interesting to see the lid lifted on Innovate UK. At a time of serious political and economic unrest, ‘levelling up’ is a policy that sees support across the country and from many who voted the current government into power. Unfortunately, levelling up has just become a buzzword used to score votes – instead of being an actionable, sensible and timely approach to regional development.
“Innovate UK could give it some fresh impetus though. After all, it already has a track record and success indicators that show it could power meaningful progress in the levelling up agenda."
The full GovGrant report is here.
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