Looking Outward
Five part Q&A with Sebastian Johnson, Head of Innovation and Inward Investment, OxLEP
1. How important is international investment to the Oxford-Cambridge Arc's success as a regional cluster?
It would be difficult to overstate how important international investment can be. Recently we’ve seen tangible evidence of the impact it can have: Singapore’s GIC recently made a landmark investment into Oxford Science Park, where there is a clear masterplan for extending the existing science park to provide the space necessary for ground breaking science and research to take place. Global investor Brookfield Asset Management have also had a real impact in the joint venture with Government at Harwell Science and Innovation Campus in Oxfordshire, supporting some of the region’s most promising innovators with access to world leading research facilities, offices, labs and talent. Over the 18 months they’ve been there, we’ve seen dramatic positive investment, growth, and commitment in the cluster development already present.
Importantly, there’s a real diversity and breadth of investment in the Oxford-Cambridge Arc, including emerging sectors such as quantum computing which has benefited from recent government investment. This backing from the public sector in turn drives further investment from reassured private sector sources of funding, creating a vortex effect which draws in overseas interest. Brookfield, for example, have recently bought the science and technology real estate enabler Arlington in a £714 million acquisition, who own a range of business parks across the Arc and the Golden Triangle. In the next few decades, it will be great to see how that investment translates into the ramping up of companies across Oxford and the Arc.
Kadans Science Partner is another excellent example of a company that has invested across the Arc: the appetite for investment is strong , driven by the extensive pipeline of University of Oxford and research centre spinouts supported by Oxford Science Enterprises who are providing early-stage finance, lending greater confidence to larger-scale investors. We need to continue to build that global leading innovation ecosystem – a delicate mixture of ingredients which drives growth and development and makes for a full financial investment journey. Many international companies are already here operating in the Arc, and already in need of greater real estate for expansion.
2. We talk a lot about the global interest in the Arc's leadership across life sciences. In which sectors does OxLEP see international investment having the greatest impact?
The life science sector is crucial as a vital strategic industry for the UK. In the last decades we’ve see the growth of medtech and life sciences in Oxford and across the Arc: the world-class facilities in the region have the power to drive results, with the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine collaboration the most recent innovation to have a genuine global impact.
From the Oxfordshire perspective, we have one of the largest space clusters in Europe at Harwell including open-source resources like the Satellite Applications Catapult. The National Satellite Test Facility is going to be vital for British based businesses looking for proof of concept for their research and development in the space sector, and businesses will want to be close to this facility to benefit from its utilities and the potential for positive spill-over and collaboration between organisations. We’ve seen foreign direct investment be particularly strong in both the life sciences and space sector.
Other important sectors for Oxfordshire and the Arc include research and development into the future of mobility. These include enterprises working to create autonomous vehicles such as Oxbotica and in electric vehicles the fast-growing Arrival which has its main research facility in Banbury in Oxfordshire. Arrival are also leading the charge across the Arc for micro-factories and other highly-technical, highly-compact sub-assembly style operations. Enterprises including Oxbotica and Oxford based StreetDrone will be at the forefront of the connected autonomous vehicle revolution, and we are already seeing big investment, and with battery technology and advanced engineering further enabling autonomous and electric vehicles we expect to see this sector grow exponentially over the next decade.
Technologies developed in Oxford and the Arc more broadly represent one of the leading clusters in the world for sustainable investment, with foreign direct investment linked to prominence and reassurance of the Oxford brand as an academic and research and development powerhouse. We’re home to the Culham Centre for Fusion Energy, the principal location for fusion energy research, where Canadian business General Fusion is investing to build and operate a Fusion Demonstration Plant. We have also seen huge interest in Tokamak Energy and First Light Fusion, two of our fast-growing fusion energy companies based in Oxfordshire and attracting international investment. Fusion and the energy sector is a very hot investment opportunity and extraordinary topical in the current environmental climate, in addition to the emerging technology to facilitate energy tech research including robotics, AI, materials science, and battery technology to name a few. We work closely with central government, through the Department for International Trade to identify international investment opportunities into these key sectors where the Arc and the UK is a global leader.
Finally, we have the emerging field of quantum. Harwell in Oxfordshire will house the National Quantum Computing Centre, operated by UKRI and set to be operational by 2023/4. We are already seeing significant uplift in enquiries around these technologies in Oxfordshire, and quick growth of spinouts from the University. This close and seamless collaboration between the private, public and academic sectors, creating critical mass around research institutes for start-ups and spinouts to succeed, can help the UK maintain momentum in key industries of the future like quantum computing. It also highlights the importance of assets we have across the Arc: these are national strategic assets for the UK, but also with a global scope and focus because of this vital proximity of research assets that are world-class.
3. Are we advertising the opportunity? How can we better internationalise the importance of innovation occurring within the Arc?
We are doing a lot better than we were historically, but we could still do a lot better. As a private sector business, Brookfield Asset Management is certainly investing both in brand and in place, and working on their business development to shout more loudly as to why people should be investing and bringing businesses both to Oxfordshire and to Harwell. Collectively there have been some good pieces of work: accessible videos and explanations around the key sectors of space, life sciences and the future of mobility. We need to be stronger in partnership with central government, utilising their investment and trade officers based across the world. There is a real chance to help them to understand what opportunities exist across the Arc, why it’s such an area of global significance for innovators and collaborators, so they can continue to broadcast the message of the Arc effectively abroad.
We need to understand how we can team up more strongly with central government, as Local Enterprise Partnerships, site owners, cluster development managers, to achieve a full and holistic approach to supporting the Arc. We have started to do more work from an Oxfordshire perspective in developing an internationalisation plan, to promote and ramp up the level of international investment coming into Oxfordshire alongside our partners both in central and local government and the private sector. We need to focus not just on new investments but also support and maximise expansion opportunities of international companies already here.
The final point is that we need to convey the impact the Arc can have on solutions to some of the world’s greatest challenges. Look at the success and global impact of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, but that’s just one example - across the Arc we are creating solutions in the transport and mobility, communication, clean growth and renewable energy sectors. We have an awesome ability to collaborate, to research, to develop and commercialise – we just have to better present and sell that to the wider world.
4. How do we share the rewards of inward investment across the whole of the Arc?
The Arc has real potential to contribute to levelling up elsewhere in the country. Ipsen Bioinnovation, located at Milton Park in Oxford, employs around 100 researchers but also contributes to the operations of a drugs manufacturing biopharm in Wrexham in the Welsh borders, providing vital jobs in a rural area. This strong relationship is mirrored many times over across the supply chains and manufacturing opportunities that the Arc produces. This gives us the basis for how we should be operating across the whole of the Arc, and above that the whole of the UK.
Space and satellite technology expertise we have in the Arc is partnering with launch capabilities being developed elsewhere in the UK; and the Fusion cluster and expertise we have in Oxfordshire is working on a cluster of clusters across the country in developing knowledge, supply chains and the UK’s Spherical Tokomak Energy Production plant. Another example is Arrival, who have made strong use of innovative micro-factories. Although their research and development may occur in Oxfordshire, Arrival’s ambition is to create a range of micro-factories across the UK where they can manufacture products for the immediate market. This is all part of the positive spillover the Arc can have across UK regions.
The Arc can also contribute to wider UK goals around carbon reduction. Innovation that happens in Oxfordshire and across the Arc can be scaled up elsewhere to have a massive impact on British business, the economy, and in helping us meet our sustainability goals agreed at COP26. This is all about creating a strong, but also inclusive, economy: Oxfordshire has strong knowledge-based innovation areas creating strong economies, but how do we ensure that wealth creation is mirrored across communities? Didcot in Oxfordshire is only a stone’s throw from Harwell and Milton Park, for example, but more one in ten children there are living in poverty. There is much to do to ensure positive action to address this disparity locally as well as nationally. In Oxfordshire OxLEP has been working with local authorities and other key stakeholders on an Oxfordshire Inclusive Economy Programme to try and address some of these issues.
5. What are the opportunities and barriers to attracting investment from overseas?
We need to understand that we are working in an incredibly competitive global environment, competing with old and new ecosystems and clusters around the world. How do we articulate what is different and unique to the UK: the Arc provides the backbone for the UK to drive the science superpower narrative and with it the message that we are at the forefront of finding solutions to the globe's greatest challenges through our research capabilities, our innovation and creativity and our talent.
I welcome the Government’s creation of the Office for Investment and the Investment Council both of which will address UK competitiveness and the attractiveness of the UK for foreign investors. In the last few decades the UK has fallen considerably behind some of its competitors in terms of incentivising investment. We particularly need to address that in areas where we have growing capabilities and expertise and where we have the opportunity to be a world leader - such as in the fields of fusion energy or quantum computing. The commitment and government investment into both these areas has been great, but alongside that investment we need to make it as easy as possible for new companies to utilise research and assets and draw them in to the Oxford-Cambridge Arc.
Innovators and entrepreneurs across the globe will want to operate in these and other emerging sectors and nations will be quick to invest to secure a global lead. We need to work closely with central government to ensure that Oxfordshire and the UK continues to be a global leader in these fields and emerging technologies, committing fully in terms of resource to help us continue to play our part in the world as a science superpower.
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