Research and development (R&D) expenditure rose by £1.6 billion to £34.8 billion in 2017, an increase of 4.8%, which was above the long-term annual average increase of 4.1% since 1990.
Figures released this morning by the Office for National Statistics, showed that Total R&D expenditure in the UK in 2017 represented 1.69% of gross domestic product (GDP), up from 1.67% in 2016, but remaining below the European Union (EU-28) provisional estimate of 2.07%.
The UK ranked 11th of all EU countries’ R&D expenditure as a percentage of GDP in 2017.
Funding of UK R&D from overseas continued to fall for the third consecutive year to £5.0 billion in 2017, which was 10.2% lower than the peak in 2014 of £5.6 billion while the UK spent £527 on R&D per head of population in 2017, with England spending £554, Scotland £466, Northern Ireland £371 and Wales £238.
Mark Tighe, CEO of R&D tax specialists Catax might be of interest:
“UK firms have been holding their own on R&D spending since the Brexit vote and this is an impressive surge to yet another record high but foreign funding continues to drain away.”
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Uk firms hold their own on Research and Development but foreign funding continues to slip away