Time for industry to take advantage of funding opportunities
1 min read
The Chancellor's speech to the House of Commons, announcing where the £11.5billion of cuts would be made, contained few surprises. Yet there were a few areas of brightness for the technology sector.
Good news came in that the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills' (BIS) budget was trimmed by only 6%. As one of the departments outside of the 'ring fence', BIS could have seen its funding slashed, but Dr Vince Cable has put up a good fight.
BIS – or its various incarnations over the years – has always been a target for Conservative MPs, particularly those from the more 'arid' side of the party, as being something of an irrelevance. Yet BIS does a good job. Jamie Urquhart, who chaired the steering committee for the recently announced ESCO Report, said about the role of government in the electronics industry: "Government involvement is important. What it does is to catalyse and it's doing more things than people realise in terms of initiatives." Government, in this case, is BIS.
One piece of good news which didn't make it into the Chancellor's speech is additional funding for the Technology Strategy Board. And that has been well received in all quarters – organisations such as the CBI, EEF and A|D|S have indicated their approval. The EEF said it 'demonstrates the importance that government is now placing on supporting innovation'. A|D|S said 'investing in science and innovation ... is critical to create a strong more balanced economy' and the CBI noted ' the £185m boost for the Technology Strategy Board – a crucial anchor for innovation – is particularly welcome'.
The Chancellor called for industry to 'keep inventing, keep delivering'. Innovation and science has been protected; now it's time for the electronics industry to take advantage of the opportunities.