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 | Newcastle & the North EastNorth East | Leeds & West YorkshireYorkshire and the Humber | Liverpool City RegionNorth West |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sectors | Clean Energy, Mobility & Transport Technology, Advanced Manufacturing Supporting: Life Sciences, Digital Technologies, Robotics & Autonomous Systems | Life Sciences, Digital Technologies, Financial Technology Supporting: Artificial Intelligence, Advanced Manufacturing, Creative Industries | Life Sciences, Engineering Biology, Advanced Materials Supporting: Digital Technologies, Clean Energy, Creative Industries |
| Research |
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|
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| Companies | Not recorded on the map. |
| Not recorded on the map. |
| Infrastructure |
Offshore renewable test facilities, battery production investment and university research centres. | Not recorded on the map. Health data infrastructure, teaching hospitals and university research facilities. | Not recorded on the map. University research institutes, automated chemistry facilities and port and logistics assets. |
| Capital | Infrastructure and development finance, with limited venture capital relative to industrial scale. | Financial services depth locally, but early-stage health technology capital remains limited. | A modest local investor base; public and charitable research funding dominate. |
| Government programmes |
| No place-based designation recorded. |
|
| What exists | Offshore renewable energy testing at national scale, battery and electrification investment, ageing and life sciences research and a strong engineering base. | National health data organisations, medical technology, a large financial and professional services base and a research university with data and materials strength. | Infection and tropical medicine research of international standing, materials chemistry and automated discovery, a large port and a Freeport designation. |
| What's missing · UKIZ interpretation | Supply chain retention. Britain builds offshore capacity while importing much of the equipment; local firms often serve as installers rather than manufacturers. | A clear route for companies to work with health data at scale, and clinical adoption pathways that move faster than pilot projects. | Translation capacity: strong discovery science with limited local scale-up manufacturing and limited early-stage capital to hold companies in the city region. |
| What could connect · UKIZ interpretation | Offshore testing capability connected to Teesside and Humber industrial land, Sheffield manufacturing research and domestic energy buyers. That is an energy supply chain rather than an energy market. | Leeds health data capability connected to Manchester clinical research and to medical technology manufacturing, giving companies discovery, evidence and production in one region. | Infection and biologics research connected to North West and Teesside biomanufacturing capacity, with the port used for export rather than only import. |
| UKIZ relevance | The region has the industrial land, the ports and the skills base. The proposed North East mission focuses on retaining the supply chain, not only the assembly. | Health data at population scale is a national asset. The proposed Manchester mission and Leeds capability are complementary rather than competing. | Discovery and manufacture here are unusually well connected, with scale-up routes that are already in use. The proposed Manchester mission treats the North West as one health and biomanufacturing geography. |
| Last verified | 15 August 2026 | 15 August 2026 | 15 August 2026 |
Proposed by UKIZ · independent · not a government designation