£39.8 billion R&D budget is largest ever

The government has announced that the Department for Business Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) will have have a research and development (R&D) budget of almost £40 billion for 2022-25.

The £39.8 billion, to be allocated between partner organisations, is the largest commitment to BEIS R&D spending and supports the government’s wider commitment to invest 2.4% of GDP into research by 2027.

Investment will support a broad range of priority initiatives, including tackling climate change and delivering levelling up opportunities across the country. Funds will also support advancement in new technologies such as clean tech and AI.

Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng said:

“My department’s £39.8 billion R&D budget – the largest ever R&D budget committed so far – will be deployed and specifically targeted to strengthen Britain’s comparative advantages, supporting the best ideas to become the best commercial innovations, and securing the UK’s position as a science superpower.”

UK Research & Innovation (UKRI) will be the largest partner to allocate funds, and will receive over £25 billion across the next 3 years. This will include an increase in funding for core Innovate UK programmes by 66% to £1.1 billion in 2024-2025, helping connect companies to the capital, skills and connections they need to innovate and grow.

The R&D budget will also support growth in the UK’s regions, helping to balance public investment in R&D outside London and the South-east, with 55% of investment going to the rest of UK by 2024-25 as targeted in the Levelling Up White Paper. Public investment also aims to stimulate further financing from the private sector, along with the R&D tax credits programme, to support businesses to investment in research: £1 of public expenditure in R&D eventually leverages an average of £2 of additional private investment, current research shows.