Government announces investment in British R&D for advanced materials development

Business and Energy Secretary, Greg Clark, has announced that the Government is to invest £229 million into scientific research and advanced materials development, as part of the Government’s modern Industrial Strategy.

The move will see £126 million worth of grants given to the Henry Royce Institute, an advanced materials centre at the University of Manchester.

The Institute, established in 2014, is named after the founder of Rolls-Royce. It was set up by the Universities of Manchester, Sheffield, Leeds, Liverpool, Oxford, Cambridge and Imperial, as well as the National Nuclear Laboratory and the Culham Centre for Fusion.

The Royce Institute focuses on graphene development, with other research areas looking at energy, engineering, functional and soft materials.

In addition, there will also be £103 million Government investment in a new national centre of excellence for life and physical sciences, at the Rosalind Franklin Institute (RFI), located at Harwell Science and Innovation Campus, Oxford.

Commenting, Clark said: “Research and development has a proven track record of making our economy more competitive and creating new products, services and better ways of doing business. For these reasons, we’ve placed the UK’s strengths in science, research and innovation at the core of our modern Industrial Strategy.

“Government investment in these two centres for advanced materials and life and physical sciences will support growth across a range of sectors, provide the skills and training to grow our expertise in these cutting-edge fields, and facilitate positive collaboration between industry, academia and Government.”

In January 2017, The government published an Industrial Strategy green paper, inviting industries, businesses and consumers to respond to the consultation online.