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 | Leeds & West YorkshireYorkshire and the Humber | Cardiff & South WalesWales | Birmingham & the West MidlandsWest Midlands |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sectors | Life Sciences, Digital Technologies, Financial Technology Supporting: Artificial Intelligence, Advanced Manufacturing, Creative Industries | Semiconductors, Advanced Materials, Creative Industries Supporting: Clean Energy, Advanced Manufacturing, Digital Technologies | Mobility & Transport Technology, Advanced Manufacturing, Quantum Technologies, Advanced Materials Supporting: Clean Energy, Digital Technologies, Defence & Security |
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| Companies |
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| Not recorded on the map. |
| Infrastructure | Not recorded on the map. Health data infrastructure, teaching hospitals and university research facilities. | Not recorded on the map. Compound semiconductor fabrication and research facilities, materials and coatings research, production studios. |
Automotive research centres, battery and vehicle test facilities and major logistics assets. |
| Capital | Financial services depth locally, but early-stage health technology capital remains limited. | Public and corporate capital dominate; venture funding is limited by capital intensity. | Corporate and supply chain finance dominate; venture capital is thin relative to industrial output. |
| Government programmes | No place-based designation recorded. |
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| What exists | National health data organisations, medical technology, a large financial and professional services base and a research university with data and materials strength. | 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 manufacturing base in the UK by employment, automotive and electrification engineering, rail and mobility research, and a young, large working-age population. |
| What's missing · UKIZ interpretation | A clear route for companies to work with health data at scale, and clinical adoption pathways that move faster than pilot projects. | Design demand. Fabrication capability needs a pipeline of UK customers designing products that use it, and capital patient enough for semiconductor timelines. | Ownership of the value in electrified vehicles: battery, power electronics and software increasingly sit outside the region and outside the UK. Innovation-active SME supply chains are under-capitalised. |
| What could connect · UKIZ interpretation | Leeds health data capability connected to Manchester clinical research and to medical technology manufacturing, giving companies discovery, evidence and production in one region. | South Wales fabrication connected to Bristol and Cambridge chip design and to defence, automotive and energy customers who currently source overseas. | Midlands manufacturing paired with battery and power electronics research, North East battery production and Coventry testing capability as a single electrification value chain. |
| UKIZ relevance | Health data at population scale is a national asset. The proposed Manchester mission and Leeds capability are complementary rather than competing. | Compound semiconductors are a genuine national specialism with a fragile ownership base. The proposed Wales mission focuses on keeping the value chain here. | The region's transition depends on owning the new value in a vehicle rather than assembling someone else's. The proposed Midlands zone focuses on batteries, power electronics and software. |
| Last verified | 15 August 2026 | 15 August 2026 | 15 August 2026 |
Proposed by UKIZ · independent · not a government designation