UK, Extra £2 Billion a Year to Be Invested in Science & Tech

uk-flagIn the Autumn Statement, UK Prime Minister Theresa May set out her vision for post-Brexit UK business including the Industrial Strategy.

According to May, an extra £2 billion a year by the end of the Parliament will be invested into science and tech.
A new Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund will direct some of that investment to scientific research and the development of a number of priority technologies in particular, helping to address historic weakness on commercialization and turning research into long-term viability.

The strategy also aims to turn startups into scale-ups by backing them for the long-term.
To this end, she said “….there is no point having great ideas, great products, great startups, if you can’t get the investment you need to grow your business here“.
In order to understand where the barriers are and to eliminate them, May announced they will launch a new Patient Capital Review – led by the Treasury – that will examine how the country can break down the obstacles to getting long-term investment into innovative firms.
The review will be supported by a panel of experts, chaired by Sir Damon Buffini.

Among other actions, the British Business Bank will invest an additional £400m in venture capital funds to unlock up to £1 billion of new investment in innovative firms planning to scale up.
To support investment in UK FinTech, the DIT will provide £500k a year for FinTech specialists. The government has commissioned an annual “State of UK FinTech” report on key metrics for investors and will launch a network of regional FinTech envoys.

FinSMEs

23/11/2016

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