Ideas to impact public sector support for research commercialisation: strengths, ambition and progress report

Ambition

Entrepreneurship and innovation are at the heart of Scotland’s economic growth plans, and the Scottish Government aims to support those with novel research and ideas to help them bring those ideas to life.

Recent Scottish Government strategies are aiming to create a nurturing and diverse environment for entrepreneurs to thrive in Scotland. Through the Scottish Technology Ecosystem Review, the Pathways Report, National Innovation Strategy and Entrepreneurial Campus Blueprint, the Scottish Government is working with partners across Scotland to provide a strong foundation and set an aligned ambition, which we are now following through on making a reality.

Scotland is now one of the fastest-growing startup economies in the UK, and among the fastest-growing in Europe. And our national enterprise agency, Scottish Enterprise is targeting business support on sectors where Scotland has world-leading strengths, providing an increasingly rich pipeline of investable opportunities, particularly via our world-class universities, in these priority areas. Our universities are increasingly positioning themselves as hotbeds of startup entrepreneurial talent and education through a collective entrepreneurial campus initiative.

However, there is still work to do to address gaps later in the founder journey, and particularly for those founders of high-growth and R&D intensive spinout companies.

To build upon the momentum we’ve generated and to advance our focus a step further on in this journey, we are working closely with our universities to further accelerate the commercialisation of research by enhancing support for creating and scaling spinouts in priority sectors tackling global challenges. This will result in our universities, in collaboration with industry and government, playing a central role in Scotland’s economic development, building an economy that is driven by world-leading research, that celebrates and harnesses the full capability of all of our innovators and entrepreneurs across the nation, to provide real and impactful benefits for the people of Scotland.