UK life sciences sector critical to economy, says UKTI report

The life sciences sector is critical to the UK economy, accounting for 183,000 UK jobs and with a total annual turnover of £56 billion, according to the UKTI Inward Investment Report 2014 to 2015

The life sciences sector is underpinned by a long term industrial strategy, and since 2014 has been championed by a minister for life sciences.

The UKTI’s Life Sciences Organisation (LSO) works to bring inward investment into the UK, from research and development (R&D) collaborations through to clinical trials, commercial and manufacturing operations and partnerships.

The report says that the UKTI’s LSO offers inward investors a bespoke service, tailoring support to the requirements of the client, whether they are making their first business inquiry and need to understand the UK landscape, or looking to connect with professional services, R&D opportunities, and supply chain partners.

The LSO focuses on bringing value added investment to the UK and recorded an increase of more than double the number of new jobs and financial investment compared to last year’s results.

Over 20% of the life sciences foreign direct investment (FDI) projects supported by UKTI teams involved global, international, or European headquarters functions being performed in the UK, while 25% were linked to manufacturing, and almost half involved an R&D element.

The report said priority source markets such as the USA continued to perform strongly while there was a notable increase in new investors from India and China.

This year, the LSO joined forces with the Office for Life Sciences, data partners and industry to launch the new UK Life Sciences Portal.

This portal serves as the central online access point to connect international and UK companies, associations, academia and R&D organisations.