The strategy launched by business secretary Vince Cable and Minister for Universities and Science David Willetts sets out the Government's plans to boost economic growth by investing in innovation and research across the UK.
The following are summaries of the key actions announced.
Catapult Centres
Technology and Innovation Centres have been rebranded as "Catapult Centres".
The Centres will aim to transform innovative ideas and technology into valuable products, processes and systems. Their primary role will be to encourage collaboration between research and business and facilitate open innovation. It is also hoped that the centres will allow businesses to access new funding streams and attract inward investment through promoting UK capabilities.
The Technology Strategy Board will invest £200 million in six catapults. The first centre, the High Value Manufacturing Catapult, was opened in October 2011 and Catapults in Cell Therapy and Offshore Renewable Energy will be opened in 2012. The technology areas for the final three Catapults will be announced in early 2012 and all six will be operational by 2013.
Innovation Inducement Prizes
The Government intends to use inducement prizes to stimulate innovation and make reference to the Ansari X prize space competition, which became a useful mechanism for solving specific challenges.
NESTA (National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts) will establish a Centre of Expertise to run, design and facilitate the prizes in areas not well covered by existing activity. The Government will co-fund the first prize with £100,000 and will also contribute £250,000 a year into a new fund to establish future prizes.
Open Data Institute
The Government propose to make publicly funded research freely available and have commissioned independent groups of academics and publishers to develop action plans for facilitating this.
£10 million will be provided over 5 years to establish an Open Data Institute to help the industry exploit the commercial advantages of releasing of its data and to develop web standards to support the Open Data agenda. The Institute will be based in Shoreditch, East London.
SMEs
£75 million is being committed over three years to support small business innovation. The following is a summary of some of the main initiatives aimed to help SMEs.
- The Smart brand is being re-launched and will replace the Grant for Research and Development and will provide funding for market and prototype development activities.
- Increasing amounts of investment will be given to the Small Business research Initiative to help technology focussed SME's compete for contracts which may be procured by the Government.
- The Technology Strategy Board launchpad competition was piloted in London this year and sought to support SME's in the Tech City cluster. The scheme was highly successful with 18 SMEs receiving funding of around £100,000 each. It is proposed that the Launchpad initiative be expanded to other parts of the UK to encourage the growth of more innovation clusters.
- Investment in the Designing Demand Programme is to be doubled to £1.3 million a year. This is a mentoring scheme run by the Design Council to help SMEs deliver improved products, services and brands to enhance their growth potential.
- £25 million is being used to help companies develop large-scale prototypes in order to attract investors.
- The R&D Tax Credit relief will be increased to 225% from April 2012.
Comment
The current coalition Government clearly recognises that the UK has the potential to be a world leader in technological innovation and the only way to reap the benefits of such potential is to increase investment. A large amount of this innovation comes from SMEs, and it is encouraging to see that investment is being made to improve collaboration, remove barriers and provide incentives in order to help SMEs generate the economic growth that is so crucial in the current climate.
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