Tapping into a rich, proud tradition in Northern Ireland - financial help is available

Some of the most notable examples of local entrepreneurship are the portable defibrillator, the modern tractor and milk chocolate.

Other innovations include the ejector seat and electric tramway and if this list is hard to swallow, you’re in safe hands, Milk of Magnesia was also developed in Northern Ireland.

As the new year gets up to speed, it’s really encouraging to see continued signals of support for Northern Ireland’s most innovative companies.

In the Autumn Statement 2022, the UK government announced increased public funding on Research & Development (R&D) to help boost economic growth and productivity through innovation to the tune of £20 billion by 2024/25.

The government also announced a £1.6billion investment in the UK’s nine Catapults including Digital Catapult Centre in Northern Ireland and committed to ensuring our most innovative firms have access to finance to help them invest and grow.

In Northern Ireland we have a burgeoning tech sector, an expanding ecosystem of innovative business start-ups and world-leading universities which are producing exciting spin-out companies.

Businesses like Liopa, a spin-out from Queen’s University, which has received grants to help facilitate its R&D from Innovate UK and Invest NI and investment from the British Business Bank through its Future Fund programme. Liopa has brought to market a visual speech recognition platform for patients who have lost the ability to speak.

Liopa’s Speech Recognition Application for the Voice Impaired (SRAVI) has already been licenced by the Royal Preston Hospital in England. The technology, which sees a user mouth words into a smartphone’s camera for the SRAVI app to speak them aloud, will be used to help communicate with those who are voice impaired such as tracheostomised patients. This example demonstrates that access to finance for innovative companies is an important step in supporting their growth.

Last year the UK’s government-funded public bodies which back innovation and R&D came together to explore the role of public funding and financing of innovation in the UK.

Working with UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), including Innovate UK, the British Business Bank released a joint report, ‘Backing innovation-led businesses: the role of public investment’ which examined how best to support these next-generation businesses.

The report found that growing the complex innovation ecosystem, and enabling innovation-led businesses to succeed, takes many ingredients, often working together in different, unique combinations. These range from enabling the translation of blue-sky research, skills and know-how in our universities and research centres, to supporting businesses by de-risking bold R&D projects, to helping ensure innovative businesses have access to the right kind of external finance to grow.

Public funding of R&D will have a significant uplift by 2024-25, and the British Business Bank has an increased volume of finance to deploy over the next three years.

We are also clear that increased collaboration in the innovation ecosystem is key to ensuring that we all pull in the same direction, aligning our investments and interventions to best effect.

At the British Business Bank we are committed to driving sustainable growth and prosperity across Northern Ireland. Our programmes will continue to help fund R&D intensive smaller businesses and later this year we will launch a new £70m Investment Fund for Northern Ireland.

By doing so, we will help in turning UK innovation ambition into a reality.

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