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 | Norwich & the EastEast of England | Nottingham & DerbyEast Midlands | Teesside & the HumberNorth East / Yorkshire and the Humber |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sectors | AgriTech & FoodTech, Engineering Biology, Clean Energy Supporting: Life Sciences, Digital Technologies | Advanced Manufacturing, Clean Energy, Mobility & Transport Technology Supporting: Advanced Materials, Digital Technologies, AgriTech & FoodTech | Clean Energy, Advanced Manufacturing, Advanced Materials Supporting: Digital Technologies, AgriTech & FoodTech |
| Research |
|
| Not recorded on the map. |
| Companies | Not recorded on the map. | Not recorded on the map. | Not recorded on the map. |
| Infrastructure | Not recorded on the map. Plant and food research institutes, genomics facilities and offshore energy operations bases. | Not recorded on the map. Propulsion and nuclear engineering facilities, rail test capability and chemistry research centres. |
Process innovation and biologics scale-up facilities, port capacity and grid-connected industrial land. |
| Capital | Research council and charitable funding dominate; venture capital is scarce. | Corporate and supply chain finance; limited venture activity. | Infrastructure capital, corporate investment and public programmes; almost no local venture base. |
| Government programmes |
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| What exists | Plant, food and genomics research of international standing, offshore energy operations and maintenance, and a significant agricultural production base on the doorstep. | Aerospace propulsion and small modular reactor engineering, rail technology, sustainable chemistry research and one of Europe's busiest air freight hubs. | 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. |
| What's missing · UKIZ interpretation | Commercial translation of agri-food science, and connection between offshore energy operations and the research base inland. | Diversification of the supply chain beyond a small number of large primes, and company formation from a strong engineering research base. | 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. |
| What could connect · UKIZ interpretation | Agri-food and genomics research connected to national food manufacturing and to engineering biology capacity, and offshore operations connected to the Humber and North East energy supply chain. | Propulsion and nuclear engineering connected to Sheffield manufacturing research and Midlands electrification. One Midlands industrial mission rather than three sectors. | 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. |
| UKIZ relevance | Food security and biotechnology intersect here more clearly than anywhere else in Britain, and connect to the proposed Oxford-Cambridge mission. | Propulsion and nuclear capability sit alongside the Midlands mobility mission. The proposed Midlands zone connects them. | This is where Britain either builds an energy supply chain or imports one. The proposed Teesside & Humber mission is explicitly about retained industrial capability. |
| Last verified | 15 August 2026 | 15 August 2026 | 15 August 2026 |
Proposed by UKIZ · independent · not a government designation