Digital economy: £120 million for innovative business projects
Our digital economy strategy outlines how we will spend £30 million a year over 4 years to support innovation in the UK's digital economy.
Jenny Griffiths, founder and CEO of Snap Fashion, a digital search business supported by Innovate UK.
Innovate UK’s digital economy strategy will help to keep the UK at the forefront of digital innovation over the next 4 years.
We will spend £15 million a year supporting innovative business projects and provide a further £15 million a year as core funding for the Digital Catapult centre, the Open Data Institute and Tech City UK.
Staying ahead of the curve
The global digital services market will be worth as much as the entire UK economy by 2020. It is essential that the UK stays at the head of this global revolution.
The strategy has 5 key objectives:
- encouraging digital innovators to develop their ideas and establish businesses
- championing approaches focused on users of digital technology
- equipping innovators with the right technical and business expertise
- growing infrastructure, platforms and ecosystems
- ensuring the digital economy is sustainable
Lighting a fire in digital innovation
Business opportunities
The pace of change is so fast in the digital economy that it is difficult to predict more than a few years ahead.
Digital technology can offer businesses huge reductions in cost, massive trading volumes with low costs, instant global market reach, and a personal relationship with the customer.
The growing capability of smart devices, the rise of the Internet of Things, growth in business services such as cloud computing, and the explosion in the amount and quality of data are all huge opportunities for UK business.
For more information see the Digital economy strategy 2015 to 2018