Innovation Greater Manchester

Greater Manchester is ready to deliver levelling up through innovation

Innovation Greater Manchester is delivering an innovation ecosystem across the city-region that will help level up our communities, generate the solutions we need to achieve net zero, and create the conditions for more businesses in more places to benefit from global exporting and inward investment.

Innovation Greater Manchester can help deliver Greater Manchester and Government’s shared aim of increasing science funding more broadly across the UK. We need to work together to attract the projects and investment that will stimulate a more productive regional Greater Manchester economy.

Innovation ecosystems in places like Greater Manchester cannot be driven top-down. To ensure investment lands in the right places, we need a new arrangement backed by and designed with businesses, investors, R&D organisations, and local and national Government.

Innovation Greater Manchester is led by business and modelled on international best practice. It is a sustainable model that ensures pioneering businesses receive the support and investment they need.

Innovation Accelerator

The Levelling Up White Paper, published at the start of this year, included plans for three new Innovation Accelerators in Greater Manchester, the West Midlands and Glasgow city-region. Businesses and research in these areas will be supported with £100m of new Government funding, adopting a model that has helped create thriving innovation ecosystems in places like Greater Boston and Silicon Valley.

The Innovation Accelerator is currently developing a portfolio of projects that will drive tens of millions of pounds’ worth of R&D investment in Greater Manchester – the first step in delivering our wider ambitions.

Read more about our Innovation Plan here. 

Innovation Greater Manchester is open to working with partners on projects that will develop the city-region’s innovation ecosystem. 

Click here to tell us more about your idea

 

 

2030 Vision: Greater Manchester will be a leader of the fourth industrial revolution and known globally for the strength of its innovation ecosystem. We will realise this vision by having an intense focus on our global strengths – in advanced materials and manufacturing, health innovation and life sciences, digital and creative, and green technologies.

 

Alongside investing in scientific excellence, we will build an environment where we more systematically commercialise and diffuse innovation through existing companies, new players and investors in the city-region, and start-ups. We will create a skills and talent pipeline, improve access to finance and promote deeper business networks that fuel enterprise and entrepreneurship.

 

Success will mean more high-quality jobs and more productive firms across all parts of the city-region and in all our sectors. It will improve the lives of people across all our communities through increased skills, better opportunities, and consequent improvements to health and reduced inequality. Our approach will be to work collaboratively with anyone who shares our vision. We will work with other city-regions and clusters around the UK and internationally to play a leading role in catalysing a new Innovation Nation.

Innovation Greater Manchester is the most developed blueprint in the country for levelling up through innovation. We’re delivering a range of projects and initiatives – with more to come as we build a world-class ecosystem.

AMPI

A new research centre located in the Rochdale-Bury Gateway North industrial park that will drive innovation among the UK’s advanced machinery manufacturers.

Crescent Salford

Crescent is where industry, education and community come together to shape the future of Salford and beyond. This £2.5bn development opportunity will see the creation of a new innovation zone where applied research, innovation and technology will help us live better and smarter.

ID Manchester

A new £1.5bn innovation district in Manchester city centre developed by the University of Manchester and Bruntwood SciTech, providing 2.6m sq ft of commercial workspace for innovation-led businesses.

Made Smarter

A comprehensive programme of support to help manufacturers innovate, adopt new technologies and upskill their workforce.

Innovation Greater Manchester Think Tank Roundtable

A roundtable discussion addressed by Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng and featuring some of the UK’s leading think tanks underlined the role for Innovation Greater Manchester in levelling up the North.