Recommendation 24

We asked UKRI if it could give us an example of a high-risk project it is supporting. UKRI gave us an example from past use of BBSRC funding where techniques were considered incredibly demanding at the time 55 Q 22 56 Q 58 57 C&AG’s Report, para 2.6 58 C&AG’s Report, para 14 59 Q 21-22 60 Q 59 61 Q 58 15 but are not used now as the science has moved on.62 We asked UKRI to give us its best example today of a high-risk, strategic and might fail project absolutely worth funding. UKRI told us of its cross council interdisciplinary responsive mode scheme, where it has set up specific funding to do interdisciplinary research that does not fit into any of the current research council remits, but it did not identify any individual high risk projects it is currently funding because of the potentially high rewards.63 We noted that it seemed the UKRI board does not have an active programme overseeing its high-risk programmes that may fail, which UKRI did not dispute, replying “No, it’s a chequerboard”.64 Scaling up commercially