The Department of Science Innovation and Technology (DSIT) wants help understanding how they can support innovation in businesses. To that end, they’ve asked us to share a survey that aims to measure levels of technology diffusion across British business and understand what barriers they face in adopting and selling these technologies.
On the topic of innovation, our newest member of the team Anastasia Bektimirova has a paper out today with her former outfit Onward on how the UK can build strategic advantage in frontier technologies.
There’s some great stuff in there about how governments tend to spread investments too thinly across multiple projects, rather than focusing on specific areas of existing or potential leadership, as well as ideas for how to remove barriers to innovation. For example, last year the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) assessed just 26% of clinical trial applications in 30 days, against a target of 98%. Read Meri Beckwith’s ‘Errors in Trials’ essay in our Operation Innovation collection for thoughts on how to fix that deadly failure.
The Government also often falls short of recognising opportunities and investing in critical infrastructure and facilities, with due seriousness and ambition to match our potential to capitalise on them. The report says the intersection of AI and engineering biology presents one such opportunity: biology research publications involving AI have grown by 50% year-on-year since 2018.
However, our research institutes, though excellent, are still struggling to match overseas leaders like the US-based Broad Institute in ambition, core facilities and resources; while a single corner in Massachusetts, the report argues, is beating Britain in biotech. Most recently, the Government’s decision to shelve £1.3 billion investment in compute which was supposed to power AI-driven research is another case in point. (Air Street Capital’s Alex Chalmers has a useful thread for anyone looking to get behind the headlines of this decision.)
One particularly refreshing thing in Allan Nixon’s and Anastasia’s report is their call for the new Government to stop trying to lead in areas where our allies are already leading. For example, our chances of catching up with advanced chip manufacturing leaders are very slim. Even with less advanced facilities, the UK has eight times fewer than Japan, six times fewer than Taiwan and the US, and less than half of Germany’s. Catching up would likely require a frontier company to establish a plant in the UK. Considering how much others are investing, it would require billions in public funding. The report suggests that chip design would be a better bet.
Future Frontiers suggests the new Government drops ‘future telecoms’, which was one of the last Government’s five priority technologies. After all, UK business telecoms R&D investment over 12 years is half of Samsung’s annual R&D spend, with the US, China, South Korea, Japan and Germany already well ahead.
As Warren Buffet said of people, but which could equally apply to governments: “The difference between successful people and really successful people is that really successful people say 'no' to almost everything.”
Breaking the US
Anastasia is now deep in the research stage of our forthcoming Special Relationship project report – looking at what’s stopping more UK businesses expanding into the US. Thanks to all the entrepreneurs and experts who have already talked to her. Drop her an email if you’re keen to share your insights.
A Thousand Flowers
On the back of my article in defence of Entrepreneurs’ Relief (well, Business Asset Disposal Relief), a journalist from a reputable publication has got in touch to see if any entrepreneurs in the network would like to talk with her about the tax breaks.
Perhaps you’ve benefited from Entrepreneurs’ Relief in the past and gone on to start and invest in more companies. Or maybe it helped convince you to start your business in the UK. If you’re happy to go on-the-record with your thoughts, drop me a message and I’ll make the intro.