Business Minister commends Scottish Industrial Strategy efforts

Business Minister Lord Henley, during a visit to Edinburgh, praised the progress made by Scottish businesses in delivering the UK’s Industrial Strategy.

Speaking to over 50 business leaders at the Scottish Council for Development and Industry (SCDI) Annual Forum today (Friday 26 April), Lord Henley showcased how, through collaboration between UK and Scottish government, Scottish businesses and regions were “rising to the occasion” to meet some of the UK’s biggest challenges.

In particular he highlighted the importance of collaboration between the SCDI and government in supporting Scottish enterprise in recent years – with £87 million of UK government funding awarded to 163 Scottish organisations through the Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund since its launch in April 2017.

The government has also invested over £1.35 billion pounds across Scotland, as part of the City and Growth Deals, aimed at providing more power and flexibility to cities in terms of employment and skills, business support and housing.

Business Minister Lord Henley said:

From addressing the needs of an ageing society, to capitalising on the benefits of artificial intelligence, it’s brilliant to see first-hand how businesses in Scotland are thriving while tackling the UK’s grand challenges.

Through collaboration between business and the UK and Scottish governments, we can ensure that we continue to back Scottish businesses, boosting productivity and creating high quality, well paid jobs.

As part of his visit, Lord Henley met with life sciences company RoslinCT to see how £887,000 of government funding, awarded in October 2018, is being used to help develop stem cell therapies for clinical use.

He also met with scientists and academia from SynthSys, Edinburgh’s virtual centre for Synthetic Biology, to tour its flagship Genome Foundry, which is using robotics and automation to assemble DNA for medical applications.