UK Research and Innovation ‘faces hard decisions’

UK Research and Innovation, which spends £8 billion of taxpayer money each year, is facing cuts.

UK Research and Innovation is facing “hard decisions” on funding future projects.

Ian Chapman, the boss of UK Research and Innovation, which spends £8 billion of taxpayer money each year on research and innovation, has been told by the government to “focus and do fewer things better”.

He explained: “When you make choices some will miss out, but if you don’t make choices everybody loses out.”

However, Stephen Tulip, UK manager of the App Association, has warned that a change in approach could have a hugely detrimental impact on the business sector.

He told the BBC: “Reducing budgets and staffing for small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) support at Innovate UK is the opposite of what our domestic start-up and entrepreneur community needs.

“Cutting access to expertise and funding for UK SMEs will harm the UK’s growth agenda and force start-ups to look elsewhere for investment and support.”

This viewpoint has been echoed by Mike Griffin, who actually created a sustainable 3D printing company with the help of Innovate UK.

Griffin warned that companies need meaningful government support in order to get their ambitions off the ground.

He said: “For small companies, early-stage backing is the bridge to market.

“If support shifts toward bigger, later-stage winners, many practical, life-changing innovations won’t survive long enough to scale.”