Recommendation 25

The government considers R&I and the diffusion of new technologies to be vital to the UK’s future and to achieving its mission to grow the UK economy.65 Achieving this growth will require UK companies to successfully scale up their commercial exploitation of R&I.66 Professor Boyle told us that while the UK has a good record of spinning out commercial ventures from R&I, it has been less successful at scaling up these ventures.67 As well as the inherent challenges of achieving commercial success, we heard from UKRI and Professor Grant that the UK now faces intense challenge from competitors.68 Professor Grant told us that other countries are developing extraordinary science bases, and doing so at a huge pace.69