Let’s get clinical: building a global life sciences hub

A new report from the CBI has called on the government to take decisive action to bolster the UK’s world-leading life-sciences sector.

The report, Let’s Get Clinical, outlines numerous ways to deliver vastly improved patient outcomes, cement the UK’s reputation as a leading hub for research and innovation, and pull ahead of growing international competition.

The life sciences sector is at the heart of economic and social prosperity in the UK. Contributing over £70bn per year to the UK economy, and employing nearly a quarter of a million people across the country, the sector plays a vital role in both driving innovation and delivering improved patient outcomes and standards of care.

Let’s Get Clinical provides a snapshot summary of the UK’s current attractiveness and direction of travel as a life sciences destination. It rates the UK on five key metrics:

1. Government backing of the sector
2. Strength of the research and innovation framework
3. A flexible healthcare system keeping pace with changing patient needs
4. Access to talent
5. Stability and competitiveness of the taxation system

The report also includes insights and examples of best practice from other global life sciences centres (USA, Switzerland, France and Singapore) and highlights where the UK could usefully learn from them in order to maintain and improve its attractiveness as a marketplace for life sciences.

The report was developed with the CBI’s Life Sciences Working Group – the main steering body for life sciences policy within the CBI. The Group includes some of the world’s largest pharmaceutical and medical technology firms, including AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Novartis, GSK and 3M.

Some of the key recommendations

• Maintain momentum on the implementation of the Life Sciences Industrial Strategy (LSIS) and ensure it is both joined-up across government and properly integrated with other aspects of the Industrial Strategy.
• The UK should invest in its clinical trials infrastructure and deliver an ambitious end-to-end research and innovation system.
• BEIS should establish a new body, Accelerate UK, to join-up existing initiatives and bring support for innovation adoption under one clear banner.
• Ensure the establishment of a UK Advanced Research Projects Agency (UK ARPA) represents a sustained investment for the UK, catalyses business engagement and helps commercialise key breakthroughs within the life sciences sector.
• Build on the success of the R&D tax credit by widening it to reflect modern research practices so it can become an engine for life sciences business investment in the UK.
• Drive forward with much needed digital transformation of the NHS; responsibly and ethically utilise its vast wealth of data to accelerate patient-centred breakthroughs in the UK.

Please get in touch with Andy Williams for further information on the report and the CBI’s work in the life sciences sector.