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 | Nottingham & DerbyEast Midlands | Sheffield & RotherhamYorkshire and the Humber | ManchesterNorth West |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sectors | Advanced Manufacturing, Clean Energy, Mobility & Transport Technology Supporting: Advanced Materials, Digital Technologies, AgriTech & FoodTech | Advanced Manufacturing, Advanced Materials Supporting: Clean Energy, Robotics & Autonomous Systems, Mobility & Transport Technology, Digital Technologies | Advanced Materials, Life Sciences, Digital Technologies, Creative Industries Supporting: Artificial Intelligence, Advanced Manufacturing, Financial Technology, Engineering Biology |
| Research |
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| Companies | Not recorded on the map. | Not recorded on the map. | Not recorded on the map. |
| Infrastructure | Not recorded on the map. Propulsion and nuclear engineering facilities, rail test capability and chemistry research centres. |
High Value Manufacturing Catapult centres, nuclear manufacturing facilities and industrial research factories. |
National materials and graphene facilities, teaching hospitals and clinical research capability, and a major broadcast production estate. |
| Capital | Corporate and supply chain finance; limited venture activity. | Public co-investment, corporate partnership and asset finance rather than venture capital. | A growing regional investor base and northern funds, with growth rounds usually led from London. |
| Government programmes |
| No place-based designation recorded. | No place-based designation recorded. |
| What exists | Aerospace propulsion and small modular reactor engineering, rail technology, sustainable chemistry research and one of Europe's busiest air freight hubs. | One of the strongest applied manufacturing research bases in Europe, covering machining, materials, nuclear manufacturing and factory-scale process development, working directly with industrial customers. | Advanced materials research including graphene and 2D materials, a large health innovation base built on hospitals and universities, a substantial digital and cyber economy, and the biggest broadcast and creative cluster outside London. |
| What's missing · UKIZ interpretation | Diversification of the supply chain beyond a small number of large primes, and company formation from a strong engineering research base. | Domestic demand. Process capability of international standard is often demonstrated for overseas primes, and local SMEs lack the capital to adopt what is proven a mile away. | The step from materials discovery to volume production, and a growth capital base proportionate to the research output. Health data at population scale is under-used by industry. |
| What could connect · UKIZ interpretation | Propulsion and nuclear engineering connected to Sheffield manufacturing research and Midlands electrification. One Midlands industrial mission rather than three sectors. | Applied manufacturing research connected to domestic customers, energy, defence, mobility and medical technology, with procurement used as the connector rather than grants. | Materials research connected to Sheffield and Midlands manufacturing, and health innovation connected to Leeds health data capability: a corridor rather than three separate cities. |
| UKIZ relevance | Propulsion and nuclear capability sit alongside the Midlands mobility mission. The proposed Midlands zone connects them. | The research holds international standing; the domestic customer base for what it produces is thinner than it should be. The proposed Midlands and Teesside & Humber missions both depend on this capability. | Manchester has scale in four different economies that rarely commission from each other. The relevant missions concentrate on connecting health, materials, digital and creative capability. |
| Last verified | 15 August 2026 | 15 August 2026 | 15 August 2026 |
Proposed by UKIZ · independent · not a government designation