Catapults: Billion-pound backing for British innovation
Simon Edmonds reports for The Manufacturer on the spectacular success of the UK’s revolutionary Catapult programme and announces a new publication that explains Innovate UK’s funding opportunities. Simon Edmonds is Deputy Executive Chair & Chief Business Officer, Innovate UK.
“Now is a great time to find out what our world-class network of Catapult centres can do for your business. In August, the Chancellor announced an additional £780m funding for the Catapults, to help innovative businesses create future technologies.
This built on the £180m announced for the North East by the Prime Minister for the Offshore Renewable Energy Catapult and the Centre for Process Innovation, part of the High Value Manufacturing (HVM) Catapult.
This significant announcement means the Catapults can build on their success and continue helping thousands of businesses across the UK to undertake innovative R&D. This long-term investment will mean the Catapults can help deliver the Grand Challenges of the Industrial Strategy in their sectors and help the UK achieve its ambition to raise investment in R&D to 2.4% of GDP by 2027.
In their first five years the Catapults have supported around 3,000 small businesses to develop and exploit new technologies. They operate more than £850m-worth of world-class facilities and are also training hundreds of apprentices and doctoral students. A shining example is the HVM Catapult, where in the last year 900 apprentices have gained invaluable practical experience with cutting-edge technologies used in modern manufacturing.
The Chancellor made the announcement during a visit to the Manufacturing Technology Centre in Coventry, which is part of the HVM Catapult. He met with apprentices and workers who specialise in automation and machining.”
Photo MTC: Gurpreet Ghataore, research engineer at the Manufacturing Technology Centre, demonstrates a mobile platform with an integrated 6-axis robot arm capable of autonomously navigating through an active workshop environment to Philip Hammond MP and Neil Rawlinson & Alex Stephenson (both MTC).
Read the full article here.