UK Innovation Map
Compare placesDifferent, not ranked.
Two or three clusters, read side by side across sectors, research, companies, capital, infrastructure, government designations and UKIZ relevance. There is no score and no ranking: British clusters are different from one another, not better or worse than one another.
Choose up to three clusters
- London
- Cambridge
- Oxford
- Manchester
- Birmingham & the West Midlands
- Bristol & Bath
- Sheffield & Rotherham
- Leeds & West Yorkshire
- Liverpool City Region
- Newcastle & the North East
- Teesside & the Humber
- Edinburgh
- Glasgow & the Central Belt
- Belfast
- Cardiff & South Wales
- Southampton & Portsmouth
- Cornwall & Plymouth
- Nottingham & Derby
- Norwich & the East
Side by side
| Dimension | Cardiff & South WalesWales | Teesside & the HumberNorth East / Yorkshire and the Humber | Nottingham & DerbyEast Midlands |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sectors | Semiconductors, Advanced Materials, Creative Industries Supporting: Clean Energy, Advanced Manufacturing, Digital Technologies | Clean Energy, Advanced Manufacturing, Advanced Materials Supporting: Digital Technologies, AgriTech & FoodTech | Advanced Manufacturing, Clean Energy, Mobility & Transport Technology Supporting: Advanced Materials, Digital Technologies, AgriTech & FoodTech |
| Research |
| Not recorded on the map. |
|
| Companies |
| Not recorded on the map. | Not recorded on the map. |
| Infrastructure | Not recorded on the map. Compound semiconductor fabrication and research facilities, materials and coatings research, production studios. |
Process innovation and biologics scale-up facilities, port capacity and grid-connected industrial land. | Not recorded on the map. Propulsion and nuclear engineering facilities, rail test capability and chemistry research centres. |
| Capital | Public and corporate capital dominate; venture funding is limited by capital intensity. | Infrastructure capital, corporate investment and public programmes; almost no local venture base. | Corporate and supply chain finance; limited venture activity. |
| Government programmes |
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| What exists | The UK's compound semiconductor cluster, combining research, fabrication and supply chain, alongside steel and coatings materials research, and a significant screen production economy. | The largest concentration of industrial decarbonisation activity in the UK: hydrogen, carbon capture, process manufacturing, biologics scale-up capability and two Freeports with substantial serviced industrial land. | Aerospace propulsion and small modular reactor engineering, rail technology, sustainable chemistry research and one of Europe's busiest air freight hubs. |
| What's missing · UKIZ interpretation | Design demand. Fabrication capability needs a pipeline of UK customers designing products that use it, and capital patient enough for semiconductor timelines. | Skills pipelines and company formation. The land, power and permits exist; the innovation companies and the technical workforce to fill them do not yet exist at the same scale. | Diversification of the supply chain beyond a small number of large primes, and company formation from a strong engineering research base. |
| What could connect · UKIZ interpretation | South Wales fabrication connected to Bristol and Cambridge chip design and to defence, automotive and energy customers who currently source overseas. | Industrial land and process scale-up capability connected to research clusters elsewhere that have technologies without a place to build them: a national scale-up site rather than a regional one. | Propulsion and nuclear engineering connected to Sheffield manufacturing research and Midlands electrification. One Midlands industrial mission rather than three sectors. |
| UKIZ relevance | Compound semiconductors are a genuine national specialism with a fragile ownership base. The proposed Wales mission focuses on keeping the value chain here. | This is where Britain either builds an energy supply chain or imports one. The proposed Teesside & Humber mission is explicitly about retained industrial capability. | Propulsion and nuclear capability sit alongside the Midlands mobility mission. The proposed Midlands zone connects them. |
| Last verified | 15 August 2026 | 15 August 2026 | 15 August 2026 |
Proposed by UKIZ · independent · not a government designation