Harnessing innovation: unlocking the UK’s next wave of growth

The UK has all the ingredients to lead the next wave of global growth. From world-class universities and research facilities to globally recognised strengths in advanced manufacturing, life sciences, creative industries and the financial services, the foundations are already in place. The challenge now is to turn this potential into prosperity.

Every day, emerging technology companies are creating new markets, opening fresh opportunities, and transforming industries. The question is how to harness this innovation more effectively so that it drives growth across the economy and improves living standards nationwide.

Mapping opportunities in the UK's innovation economy

To unlock the UK's strengths, we first need to understand where innovation is happening and how it is evolving. Using advanced data platforms, such as The Data City, we can track real-time growth in emerging sectors and clusters. This allows us to map market size and potential, forecast trajectories, and pinpoint areas of commercial opportunity.

For example, our work for the Energy & Climate Intelligence Unit here assessed the economic potential of different technology adoption scenarios in the UK's electric vehicle manufacturing sector. The analysis highlighted not only the scale of the opportunity, but also the regions and supply chains best placed to benefit, and the jeopardy from failing to realise the potential.

For businesses, this kind of intelligence supports better decisions on where to allocate resources and how to build the right partnerships to scale. For policymakers, it provides the evidence needed to design regional growth strategies and nurture the next generation of innovation clusters.

Listening to businesses on adoption

The UK's innovative capacity also depends on how technologies are applied in practice. That is why hearing directly from businesses is essential. Through surveys and engagement, supported by our connection to the UK's largest business network, we capture unique insights into adoption trends.

These conversations reveal where firms are already deploying new technologies, what applications they see on the horizon, and which barriers are slowing progress. The picture that emerges is nuanced: some sectors are moving quickly, while others need targeted support to accelerate take-up.

Past collaborations, such as with the LSE's Centre for Economic Performance, have explored how firms are approaching artificial intelligence and the green transition. Their findings offered a window into how businesses expect these technologies to affect productivity, jobs and competitiveness over the medium-term.

Such insights help bring the UK's innovation story to life - not just a set of statistics, but as lived experience across industries and regions.

Quantifying wider economic and social benefits

Innovation has ripple effects across the economy. It creates high-value jobs, draws on supply chains in foundational sectors such as construction and financial services, and generates wider gains in terms of productivity, skills, and community prosperity.

Our modelling work demonstrates these impacts in concrete terms. For example, a recent assessment for an off-grid hydrogen production SME explored how scaling scenarios could benefit South Wales. We evaluated the creation of highly productive jobs, wider economic multipliers, and potential fiscal revenues. The results provided compelling evidence for investors and policymakers alike.

For entrepreneurs in emerging technology sectors, such as Quantum or CleanTech, this kind of evidence can be decisive. It shows that innovation is not only commercially viable, but also a driver of regional growth and national competitiveness.

Unlocking the UK's future potential

The UK already has the talent, research base, and industrial strengths to lead the industries of the future. What is often missing is clarity: clear evidence on where the opportunities lie, how technologies are being adopted, and what their wider impact will be.

This is where CBI Economics plays a role. By combining data-led insights with the voices of business and rigorous economic analysis, we help ensure innovation's benefits cut through the noise and are understood by investors, policymakers and the public.

Ultimately, the prize at stake is significant: more resilient businesses, higher living standards, and a more competitive UK economy.

How evidence supports innovation

Through our work with innovators and policymakers, we provide:

• Forecasts of technology adoption that show how emerging markets could evolve.
• Assessments of economic contribution that capture jobs, value-added and productivity gains.
• Regional and national impact studies that reveal where opportunities will arise.
• Investment crowd-in analysis showing how innovation can attract wider private capital.
• Stakeholder and end-user insights to better understand adoption and barriers to growth.

Each of these tools is ultimately about one thing: building the evidence base that helps innovation scale faster and more effectively.

The bottom line

Innovation is one of the UK's greatest strengths, and one of its greatest opportunities. By supporting innovators to prosper and scale at pace, we can help new industries flourish and existing industries thrive, while making meaningful improvements to living standards across the country.

If you're looking to showcase the impact of your technology or build the case for investment and growth, we'd be delighted to talk.

About CBI Economics

CBI Economics is the trusted economic consultancy of choice for organisations across many industries, with a proven track record of delivering robust and independent analysis that changes hearts and minds. We are one of several organisations that can help develop the evidence base necessary to support arguments for or against changes in policy. However, what is often missing in other organisations is a deep understanding of the government machinery, the policy landscape and the media environment.

The strength of our knowledge in these areas enables us to be market-leading when it comes to the impact of our work, be that framing the analysis such that it can be most effective in opening productive discussions with government departments or in creating media impact. At CBI Economics, we have the unique expertise which brings these skills together.

Find out more about our services and read our most recent work.

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