6th April, 2021

The Catapult Network welcomes the recommendations made in the BEIS Review of Catapults published today by the Government. The report describes the findings of their inquiry into how Catapults can better contribute to delivering the UK’S R&D roadmap.

The Catapult Network Chair, and CEO of Digital Catapult, Dr Jeremy Silver commented:

“It is good to see this recognition of Catapults as a national strategic asset. Over the last ten years, Catapults have been making growing contributions to UK innovation individually and we welcome the encouragement to act more collectively. We will continue to develop our vision to support economic levelling, increase investor confidence and nurture talent that will address national and global challenges, and contribute to recovery and growth.

We will continue to encourage deeper engagement with universities in order to achieve a stronger alignment of incentives and ensure more effective ways of translating research into innovation. We also welcome the opportunity to explore new skills development.

Catapults provide facilities and support to established and early-stage companies that are trail blazers or break the mould in order to stimulate growth in new markets sectors. We build on opportunities not just market failures. So we look forward to further engagement with colleagues across Government, UKRI, and Innovate UK, to review and update our mutual ways of working in order to continue to extract the best value from public investment in R&D and in Catapults.”

The Catapults have led in collectively delivering over 14,000 industry collaborations, over 5000 academic collaborations and supported over 8,000 innovative SMEs across a wide range of sectors and extended international partnership projects. 

The main recommendations of the BEIS review report are:

• Catapults will look for opportunities to support the levelling up agenda, directing economic growth and productivity to regions across the UK.
• Each Catapult takes a strategic role in identifying future skills needs and gaps in their sector, and the opportunities to address those needs in their local economy.
• Catapults and universities to deepen their existing engagement where this is bringing benefit and promoting faster translation of academic research into commercial success.
• Catapults to develop their role in supporting access to finance for innovative companies, sharing best practice across the network.
• Each Catapult has an Equality, Diversity and Inclusion plan (EDI) setting out how they are improving EDI and how they are supporting EDI in innovation.
• Performance management and evaluation approaches are refined to reflect the individual nature of each Catapult, alongside a core set of common KPIs and independent review panels.

The full report is available to download here.

About the Catapult Network

The Catapult Network supports businesses in transforming great ideas into valuable products and services. We are a Network of world-leading technology and innovation centres established by Innovate UK. We deliver impact across the UK economy, enabling businesses to thrive in global markets. Since inception the Catapults have collectively played a lead role in delivering over 14,000 industry collaborations, over 5000 academic collaborations and supported over 8,000 innovative SMEs across a wide range of sectors and extended international partnership projects.