A new report from Metro Dynamics draws together the insights of 90 leaders on what it will take to build, scale and sustain successful innovation ecosystems across the UK.
By Fiona Tuck and Emma Lindsell
Download Turning innovation ambition into economic growth in places across the UK
In June 2026, Metro Dynamics supported the inaugural UK Global R&D and Science Investment Summit and hosted three connected roundtables exploring how innovation ambition can be converted into economic growth in places.
The conversations brought together around 90 leaders from industry, universities, investment, national and local government, and innovation organisations from across the UK.
Each session approached the challenge from a different perspective.
Professor Dame Jessica Corner, Executive Chair of Research England, chaired a discussion on translating national strategy into thriving local innovation ecosystems.
Stephen Jones, Director of Core Cities UK, chaired a conversation about the next chapter for the UK’s established innovation cities and what it will take to move from strong foundations to greater scale.
Tom Walker, Executive Director for Policy, Economy and Investment at Essex County Council, chaired the final roundtable on the next generation of innovation places, including county economies, smaller cities, rural areas and polycentric regions.
The series was hosted by Metro Dynamics Director Fiona Tuck and independent adviser Emma Lindsell, with support from Ed Whiting, Chief Executive of Leeds City Council.
Today, we are publishing Turning innovation ambition into economic growth in places across the UK, bringing together the shared conclusions, challenges and practical implications arising from those discussions.
The next phase must be about outcomes
The starting point was clear. The UK does not lack innovation ambition, research strength, strategies, programmes or physical assets.
The challenge is turning them into productive businesses, private investment, good jobs and sustained economic growth.
That requires a shift in emphasis: from assets to systems, from strategy to delivery, from coordination to commercial execution, and from broad sector propositions to the detailed work of identifying, shaping and backing real opportunities.
Three conclusions stood out.
1. Outcomes and innovation throughput need to be front and centre. Success cannot be judged only by funding announcements, buildings opened, programmes launched or businesses supported. Places need to understand whether ideas and businesses are moving through the system towards customers, investment, growth and wider economic value.
2. We need to grip, quickly, the institutional architectures that enable delivery. Collaboration across places, sectors and institutions is increasingly essential, but it cannot rely on goodwill alone. Places need governance arrangements, delivery vehicles and partnership models that help people make choices, act across administrative boundaries and move at the pace of opportunity.
3. We need to value purposeful soft infrastructure, without dissolving into abstraction. Innovation ecosystems ultimately work through people, relationships, commercial expertise, leadership and trust. These can include experienced business mentors, peer networks, cluster leaders, investment curators, commercial translators and the people who maintain momentum between formal meetings. Without purpose, networks become talking shops. Without leadership, physical assets and funding programmes struggle to generate sustained growth.
Commercial demand must become the organising principle
Ultimately, the purpose of innovation policy is not to create projects, programmes or institutions. It is to create the conditions in which businesses can create value for customers, grow and invest.
This means starting more often with commercial demand, rather than research supply alone.
What problems do businesses need to solve? What will customers buy? Where can a place genuinely lead? Which other places, institutions or businesses are needed to complete the commercial value chain?
It also means moving beyond a system designed simply to create companies towards one designed to create commercially successful businesses. Proof of market and proof of customer need to sit alongside proof of concept, with sales, procurement, customer discovery and business development introduced much earlier.
The report also challenges the narrow emphasis placed on start-ups, founders and venture-backed spin-outs. These businesses matter enormously, but they are not the whole economy. Established companies, family-owned firms and supply-chain businesses are central to innovation, productivity and growth, particularly in industrial, rural and non-metropolitan places.
From shared intent to practical implementation
The report sets out implications for every part of the innovation system.
National government needs to move from designing additional programmes towards accelerating regional ecosystems and helping places build the leadership, capability and institutional models required to deliver.
Devolved and local government should orient systems around the highest-impact commercial opportunities, without attempting to own or lead every element.
Industry needs to step into purposeful ecosystem leadership, helping to define demand, open supply chains, shape investable propositions and mentor other businesses.
Universities need to lean further into commercial acceleration. Investors should engage earlier in shaping credible pipelines. Professional bodies and learned societies can help places access expertise, networks and experienced leadership.
Across the system, the priority is now execution.
Places need the tools, capabilities, relationships, delivery models, investment propositions and measures that enable them to turn ambition into economic outcomes. They need to know where broad consensus is essential, where smaller groups can move more quickly and how different economic geographies can work together to complete value chains rather than simply compete over individual assets.
The direction is increasingly clear. The task now is to move from shared intent to practical implementation, and to do so at greater pace.
We see this report as the start of the next phase of the conversation, not the end. We welcome further discussion, challenge and debate and will continue to explore opportunities to convene leaders around the ideas and actions it raises.
For further information, contact Fiona Tuck or Emma Lindsell at fiona.tuck@metrodynamics.co.uk or emma.j.lindsell@gmail.com