Sheffield City Region set for first science and innovation audit

Sheffield City Region is to work with Lancashire as one of five groups to pilot the Government’s science and innovation audits (SIAs).

The initiative was launched in July 2015 at Sheffield’s Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre (AMRC) as a way to identify opportunities for investment and research across different regions.

Sheffield City Region and Lancashire are joined by Edinburgh and the Lothians City Region, South West England and South East Wales, Greater Manchester and East Cheshire and the Midlands Engine as part of the pilot.

Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs), universities, research organisations and businesses were invited to form consortia to apply to trial the audits. Business secretary Sajid Javid and universities and science minister Jo Johnson selected the pilots areas from expressions of interest submitted in November last year.

Announcing the pilot areas, Mr Javid said: ” Auditing the strengths in our regions will help us to build a long term strategy for global competitiveness and help ensure that hotspots generate more than the sum of their parts.

“Science and innovation are crucial to increasing regional productivity and growth which is why we’ve protected the science budget in real terms until 2020, and why we are developing a National Innovation Plan.”

The audits will be used to identify areas of “global competitive advantage across the UK”, in order to develop innovation strategies and map out local priorities. Building links between universities, business and LEPs is also a central aim.