News Archive
Don’t leave physics behind – response to DIUS Innovation Report
Institute of Physics
4 December 2008
The Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills (DIUS) has today published its first innovation report to track the progress made by the UK government in making the UK the best place in the world to run an innovative business.
In response to the innovation report, John Brindley, Director of Membership and Business at the Institute of Physics, said, “R&D and innovation being undertaken now is key to ensuring we are ready to compete once the world’s economies start to pick up again. It’s encouraging to see the Government devoting effort to catalysing and tracking successful innovation in the UK.
“For the UK to not be left behind however there needs to be a clearer focus on R&D specifically. R&D is what drives new products and technologies for sale at home and abroad and as the £70bn in GVA that physics-based industries deliver to the UK grows in importance, with other sectors suffering decline, there is more that can be done to support the physics-based sector.
“The Innovation Report has built its conclusions on an ill-defined innovation metric and much of the good news surrounding it is based on strong R&D in the pharmaceutical industry. We need to ensure that physics-based industries, constituting six per cent of the economy even before the credit crunch, are not left behind.”
^ To the top ^