Introduction by the Chair
I am delighted to introduce UK Research and Innovation’s (UKRI’s) Annual Report and Accounts for 2024-25. This marks the end of the third year of our five-year Transforming Tomorrow Together strategy, and I welcome UKRI’s tremendous progress in delivering on its ambitions.
Research and innovation (R&I) are widely recognised as vital to delivering the decade of national renewal that is central to the new Government’s agenda. In October, we welcomed the Government’s protection of R&I budgets in the Autumn Budget and its recognition of R&I’s importance to delivering prosperity and wider benefits pursued through the national missions.
UKRI is uniquely placed to deliver on the Government’s mission to kickstart economic growth. Our breadth of sector networks and investment partners enables us to break down barriers between disciplines and sectors, and between R&I and wider society.
This year, we prioritised joining-up our R&I communities by accelerating support for the translation and commercialisation of discovery research, as well as dynamically reshaping our strategic investments to deliver growth-focused outcomes. In doing so, we welcomed opportunities to work closely with the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) and other government departments to maximise the UK’s public R&I portfolio.
We continue to invest wisely, making careful decisions to manage budgets responsibly and balance short- and long-term priorities, from protecting curiosity-driven research to maintaining the competitiveness of the UK’s R&I infrastructure and skills base. As we work through the current spending review as the UK’s public sector R&I manager, we recognise the pressures on the UK’s university system and are working closely with our R&I communities to invest responsibly and harness the UK’s ingenuity to deliver the best possible outcomes.
I thank Professor Dame Ottoline Leyser for her exceptional five years as UKRI’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO). She has delivered a step-change in operational effectiveness and cross-discipline funding, and has effectively guided UKRI through challenging times, most notably during the COVID-19 pandemic. I am delighted that Professor Sir Ian Chapman will take over as CEO in August 2025 to lead UKRI through a time of significant internal and external change. His skills and expertise will be vital in driving forward UKRI’s stewardship of the UK’s R&I system.
We have demonstrated our agility this year by embedding the benefits from our technology platform replacement and wider internal change programmes, as well as adapting to rapidly evolving economic and geopolitical conditions. UKRI’s Board has been crucial in fostering this agility. We have established improved performance and risk management processes, stood down UKRI’s Organisational Change Committee with assurance activity continuing under our Audit, Risk and Assurance Committee, and established a new Growth Committee, which first met in April 2025.
I thank Professor Sir Ian Boyd, Dr John Fingleton and Professor Sir Anthony Finkelstein, who stepped down from the board this year, for their invaluable contributions to UKRI’s success. I also warmly welcome Annie Callahan, Rita Dhut, Professor Jane Norman and Russell Schofield-Bezer, who joined the board in 2024 to 2025. Their appointments guarantee that the board continues to possess the extensive experience and expertise that will ensure that UKRI is well run and delivers value for money.
This is a critical time for research and innovation in the UK. UKRI will need to harness its deep expertise to make the challenging prioritisation choices that are required to enhance the efficiency of our portfolio. Our talented staff’s immense commitment and our ongoing operational improvements give me high confidence that UKRI will meet this challenge and continue maximising the impact of every pound we invest.
Sir Andrew Mackenzie, Chair
Introduction by the CEO
Research and innovation (R&I) are fundamentally about hope and empowerment, bringing people together to improve lives and livelihoods for everyone. They have the power to turn challenges into opportunities, forging diverse and inclusive communities to find solutions.
UKRI is a critical national resource in this shared endeavour that underpins our five-year 2022 to 2027 strategy Transforming Tomorrow Together. I am delighted to outline our progress in delivering on our Strategy’s objectives as set out in our Council Strategic Delivery Plans, with Siobhan Peters, UKRI’s Chief Finance Officer, serving as interim Accounting Officer for the 2024 to 2025 Annual Report and Accounts, following the end of my term as Chief Executive Officer in June 2025.
This year, we have worked closely with government to ensure that the whole public investment in research and development is optimised, to deliver the new Government’s priority outcomes as efficiently and effectively as possible. Alongside our core budget allocation from DSIT, UKRI has delivered an additional £1.5 billion in R&I on behalf of other government departments and wider DSIT programmes.
I have welcomed the new Government’s focus on benefits for citizens and its recognition of the centrality of R&I to driving growth and opportunity across the UK. We have catalysed the UK’s R&I base to accelerate public and private sector programmes aligned with the new Government’s five Missions. These have included our £85.6 million investment in the Offshore Renewable Energy Catapult, and our £32 million programme supporting 98 projects using AI to improve the UK’s productivity.
In October, I welcomed the Government’s commitment to R&I in the Autumn Budget. As we navigate a challenging economic environment, our focus now more than ever must be on delivering and leveraging the most from every pound of investment and working collectively across government and our R&I communities to make smart and strategic investment choices.
Our strategic themes are an excellent example of how we can deliver on this imperative. They allow us to leverage the exceptional work of our nine councils through additional targeted investments that capture synergies and build partnerships across the UK and beyond.
Examples from this year include our £14.8 million Resilient Coastal Communities and Seas programme with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA), and our £25 million Accelerating the Green Economy investment in five new green industry centres bringing together researchers, businesses and local leaders across the UK.
We have also taken great strides this year in implementing our new streamlined doctoral funding framework. This is developing the people and teams that we need to underpin a thriving and connected UK R&I system. We have invested over £500 million in new Doctoral Landscape and Focal Awards to support over 4,700 studentships extending across the biological, engineering and physical, and natural and environmental sciences. These investments are pivotal to building the R&I workforce and creating the ideas and innovations needed to power economic growth and improve public services.
To realise these benefits, we also recognise that we must break down barriers to opportunity and widen access to the diverse, fulfilling careers that research and innovation offer. In January, we announced the largest real-terms increase in the stipend for UKRI-funded students since 2003, as well as changes to our doctoral funding terms and conditions to foster a system that is better equipped to support students, no matter their background and needs.
Across UKRI, we strongly believe that research and innovation should be by everyone, for everyone. This year, we have focused on empowering communities by launching a £9 million Community Research Networks programme with the Young Foundation. This investment is putting funding into the hands of communities to tackle the issues that matter most to them, enhancing connectivity within and between the UK’s regions and enriching an R&I system to benefit from diverse expertise and understanding.
National prosperity depends on this connectivity and a high-productivity, thriving economy right across the UK. We have therefore strengthened our investment this year in local research and innovation clusters, including a £16 million investment in Innovate UK’s Launchpad programme and the launch of two new Arts and Humanities (AHRC) led creative industries R&I clusters in Birmingham and Liverpool. These investments are nurturing the connections between organisations, businesses and local leaders that drive economic growth and create high-quality jobs.
Key to transforming our economy and public services across the UK is the rapid development, adoption and diffusion of critical technologies. One highlight this year was the launch of five new quantum technology hubs that will ensure the UK benefits from the potential of quantum technologies in healthcare, national security and wider sectors.
The launch of over £25 million of International Science Partnerships Fund (ISPF) programmes enable global collaboration across AI, quantum, engineering biology, telecoms and semiconductors. It reflects our commitment to maintaining the UK’s world-leading capabilities and advancing the evolution of these technologies.
UKRI’s wide reach across all disciplines means that we are ideally placed to maintain the UK’s national capability in curiosity-led research. In November, I was delighted to attend the inaugural meeting of awardees from our Cross Research Council Responsive Mode pilot scheme, bringing interdisciplinary teams together to explore diverse areas including treatment for bile duct cancer and protecting children’s digital data. Unlocking innovative approaches that would not be possible from established disciplinary thinking, the award and launch of the scheme’s first and second rounds this year demonstrate UKRI’s unique ability to forge connections across our diverse R&I communities.
This has been a year of ongoing change for UKRI. We have progressed the delivery of our change programme aimed at providing simpler, better and more integrated IT platforms, harmonised processes, and more agile collaboration across the organisation, in line with the Grant Review of UKRI and the Tickell Review of research bureaucracy’s recommendations.
The scale of work has been significant. It has required managing internal pressures emerging from delays to the implementation of new IT platforms, alongside challenging reductions in operating expenditure. I recognise the significant impacts that this has had on our people and their perseverance in developing and operating manual workarounds during the transition.
We are now focused on capturing the benefits from our new technology platform, including the transition to the UKRI Funding Service, and learning from the insights of our R&I user communities. We have made substantial progress, with all new awards now made through the Funding Service and the platform passing its public beta assessment, marking major milestones in our mission to make our funding service simpler and better.
UKRI’s progress in the past year would not have been achieved without the remarkable creativity and innovation of our staff, whose outstanding breadth of expertise is vital to fostering the world-class R&I system that the UK has and needs. I am inspired by our staff’s dedication to making UKRI an inclusive environment where diverse ideas and approaches are welcome and can drive excellent outcomes. I would particularly like to highlight the invaluable work of our staff networks. I am delighted that UKRI was recognised as a Carer Confident Active Employer this year, reflecting our commitment to support carers in the workplace to combine their work and caring responsibilities.
The diverse expertise and collaborative ethos of UKRI’s Executive Committee is also inspiring. I would like to express my gratitude to Professor Mark Thomson and Indro Mukerjee for their positive contributions as Executive Chair for Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) and Innovate UK, respectively, and for the excellent work of Professor Guy Poppy as Interim Executive Chair of Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC).
I have been delighted to welcome Professor Anne Ferguson-Smith, Professor Michele Dougherty and Dr Stella Peace as Executive Chair for BBSRC and STFC and Interim Executive Chair for Innovate UK.
The creation of UKRI has been transformative. Our budgets are now 30% higher than in 2018, including a more than 50% increase in the Innovate UK budget across 2022 to 2025. Major challenge-led and investigator-led cross-disciplinary and cross-sector programmes have been established. There is a strong portfolio of council-specific and UKRI-wide interventions to improve R&I culture and ensure the next generations of researcher and innovators can thrive. And of course, there is all the extraordinary research and innovation that we have delivered and enabled within our facilities and centres, and across the R&I communities we serve.
Leading UKRI over the past five years has been a huge honour, and I am confident that the organisation will continue to realise its full potential under the leadership of my successor, Professor Sir Ian Chapman. There is always more to be done, and I know the extraordinary people across UKRI will continue to deliver extraordinary outcomes for the UK and beyond.
Professor Dame Ottoline Leyser, Chief Executive
Performance overview
UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) is the largest public funder of research and innovation (R&I) in the UK, spanning all disciplines and all sectors.
We invest in people, places, ideas, innovation and impacts, empowering researchers, innovators and entrepreneurs to turn the many challenges we face into opportunities.
We work with partners to transform tomorrow together, creating tangible benefits: advancing knowledge, improving lives, and creating the industries and jobs of the future.
Some examples are shared in the following section.
UKRI investments continue to boost creative industries
New technologies, business models and jobs are being created by leveraging Liverpool’s regional strengths to innovate in music, via a new MusicFutures cluster led by Liverpool John Moores University and supported by AHRC.
Positioning Glasgow as a global leader in MRI Coil Innovation
The Living Laboratory in Glasgow is revolutionising magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) diagnostics with cutting-edge coil technology, driving clinical impact and commercial growth. Backed by UKRI’s Strength in Places fund, the partnership between industry, academics at the University of Glasgow, and the NHS aims to position Glasgow as a global hub for coil innovation.
World-leading wind turbines in Northumberland
An £85.6 million UKRI commitment to wind power in Blyth, Northumberland will establish the world’s most advanced wind turbine testing facility.
Connecting innovation labs for product design
Boosting SME manufacturers’ productivity with digital tools, Thales Northern Ireland won the 2024 Manufacturing Innovation Award for developing the Connected Reconfigurable Factory (COREF), a multi-million-pound Innovate UK-funded initiative.
Software saving millions for train companies
The UK rail industry has saved an estimated £320 million over seven years, using optimisation software developed by Dr Raymond Kwan’s team at the University of Leeds and based on 50 years of research, much of it funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC). The software is used by 90% of UK train companies.
Enhancing shared lab access at Warwick
Shared equipment access for academia and industry is being enhanced via the Bio-Analytical Shared Resources Laboratories led by Dr Sarah Bennett, a BBSRC-funded project lead at the University of Warwick.
New tiles making rivers eel-friendly
Eel numbers have plummeted by over 95% since the 1980s. Researchers at Cardiff University funded by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) and EPSRC have discovered that cheap and easy-to-install ‘peg-board’ tiles are helping juvenile eels to negotiate man-made structures, migrate upstream and maintain the freshwater element of their lifecycle.
Boosting electric car batteries at STFC facility
Electric vehicle range has been boosted, alongside the advancement of clean energy technologies, AI and quantum materials, by a UK-Canadian research team testing solid-state lithium batteries at STFC’s ISIS Neutron and Muon Source at the Harwell Campus in Oxfordshire.
Developing new therapies against Alzheimer’s
Potential new therapies to selectively remove aggregated tau proteins linked to Alzheimer’s have been developed by scientists at the UK Dementia Research Institute, Cambridge, and the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology.
Exposing injustice: the Horizon scandal
The Post Office Project has been pivotal in exposing systemic legal failings behind the Horizon scandal, influencing the public inquiry and amplifying the voices of victims. Led by Professor Richard Moorhead at the University of Exeter and funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), the research is now driving reforms in legal ethics and regulation to help prevent future miscarriages of justice.
How we are organised
UKRI is a non-departmental public body sponsored by DSIT.
We are nine councils: seven focused on specific sets of disciplines, such as economics or physics, and two focused on a specific sector (business or academia).
All nine councils have a responsibility to foster a fully integrated, high-performing research and innovation system, through a portfolio of individual, collaborative and collective investments, and wider interventions.
This flexible and agile approach ensures that we:
- achieve better research and innovation outcomes
- provide better services to our communities
- deliver better value for public funds
How we are governed
The UKRI Board is our primary governing body. It oversees our activities, including delivery of our strategy. The board provides updates and advice to the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology.
Our Executive Committee (ExCo) provides strategic advice to the board, and is responsible for delivering the board’s vision by overseeing the organisation’s overall performance and delivery. ExCo is primarily made up of the Executive Chairs of each of our nine councils. They are advised by a council of external members.
Our mission
UKRI is the engine for the UK as a research and innovation powerhouse. We invest more than £8 billion each year on behalf of the UK government, leveraging expertise across all disciplines and sectors. We inspire and enable talented people and teams to push the boundaries of discovery, support innovative businesses to grow and scale across the UK, and target solutions to national and global priorities, transforming tomorrow together.
Our mission is to convene, catalyse and invest, in close collaboration with others, to build a thriving, inclusive research and innovation system that connects discovery to prosperity and public good. We enrich lives by increasing our understanding of ourselves and the world around us, supporting innovative businesses and public services, and delivering better outcomes for citizens through the Government’s Missions and beyond.
We seek to be a responsible organisation in the activities, research and innovation we fund, and in how we inspire, lead and engage our staff, our partners and our communities. Our four principles for change (diversity, connectivity, resilience and engagement) are fundamental to how we work as an organisation, and help to create the conditions for the UK’s research and innovation system to flourish.
Our strategy
Our strategy, Transforming Tomorrow Together, sets out how we will work with our many partners and stakeholders to create economic, social, environmental and cultural benefits for all citizens.
The six objectives in our strategy will ensure that the UK has the people, institutions, infrastructures and partnerships to support a thriving R&I system. Our vision is for an outstanding research and innovation system in the UK to which everyone can contribute and from which everyone benefits, enriching lives locally, nationally and globally.
This 2024 to 2025 Annual Report and Accounts sets out the progress we have made against our ambitions and activities as laid out in our Corporate Plan and the nine Strategic Delivery Plans of our councils. These delivery plans describe the ways in which we deliver through the 2022 to 2025 spending review period and how we monitor our progress in delivering against our six strategic objectives. This underpins the analyses presented in this performance report.
Six strategic objectives
We are committed, through our six strategic objectives, to advancing curiosity-led research, harnessing UK R&I strengths to drive UK innovation-led growth, and enhancing public services and wider benefits for citizens.
- People and careers: investing in talent and skills to build the R&I workforce the UK needs.
- Places: driving local innovation-led growth and benefits for citizens by empowering the UK’s globally leading R&I organisations, infrastructures, sectors and clusters, and ensuring their resilience.
- Ideas: delivering new discoveries from excellent curiosity-led research.
- Innovation: driving economic growth and creating high-quality jobs through catalysing knowledge exchange and commercialisation, and supporting innovation-led businesses to start, grow and scale in the UK.
- Impacts: harnessing the UK’s world-class R&I to tackle national and global challenges, improve public services, drive growth and deliver better outcomes for citizens.
- A world-class organisation: making UKRI the most efficient and effective organisation we can be, to maximise the benefits of our work for the UK.
Our frameworks for performance and risks
The UKRI Framework for Performance provides assurance for the delivery of our strategy across the full logic model, from activities we set out in our Strategic Delivery Plans and Corporate Plan, to the outcomes and societal benefits these activities collectively realise. The components feeding into the framework are summarised in the following points:
- local performance reporting and monitoring (inputs)
- Progress and Performance Report (activities)
- implementation reviews and deep dives (outputs)
- Annual Balanced Scorecard (outcomes)
- Annual Report and Accounts (impact)
Our Framework for Performance allows us to consider our performance at stages across the R&I cycle. It is underpinned by a high-level logic model that links our inputs and activities to the anticipated outputs, outcomes and impacts that realise our strategic ambitions.
Key reports throughout the year provide regular monitoring of how we are delivering the activities and near-term outputs identified in our Corporate Plan and Strategic Delivery Plans. They also enable us to review longer-term trends and how we are enabling the outcomes and impacts identified within our strategy.
Our Quarterly Progress and Performance Report includes a set of 23 performance measures to monitor our progress against each of the objectives within our strategy. The three to five measures for each strategic objective focus on where and how we are investing, particularly through activities such as delivering new grants and investments, as well as activities and near-term outputs related to organisational performance.
Our Annual Balanced Scorecard includes around 100 performance measures that cut across our strategic objectives and focus on the longer-term outcomes and impacts of our activities in the wider R&I system and economy. These include measures of what UKRI-enabled research is delivering in new knowledge and policy engagement, as well as the outcomes of our work in driving wider R&I system and culture change.
We also carry out targeted implementation reviews and deep dives throughout the year, providing an in-depth exploration of our performance within key areas, to assess and support delivery confidence. Localised reporting and monitoring support the development of these reviews and our key reports, and this is led at a fund, programme or directorate level across the organisation.
The performance measures across our UKRI reporting products combine to form a flagging system that identifies strengths and areas for further consideration, enabling our board and committees to track our performance against our strategic ambitions and identify areas of focus for continued improvement.
Risk management framework
Our Framework for Performance informs and is in turn shaped by our Risk Management Framework, which is comprised of:
- risk management strategy
- risk management policy
- risk management process
- risk appetite statement
UKRI oversees risk mitigation through its Enterprise Risk Management System, evaluating the effectiveness and progress of risk controls and actions. These documents set out UKRI’s overall approach to managing risk to achieve our strategic objectives.
The framework works cohesively with other organisational frameworks to support risk owners and risk managers, in particular through UKRI’s business partnering model, and enables the assessment and management of aggregated risk across the organisation.
Performance summary
Over the last year, UKRI has invested:
- £1,633 million in our rolling portfolio of research and development grants, including fully open funding opportunities and strategically targeted opportunities focused on specific priorities (£1,578 million in 2023 to 2024)
- £2,131 million strategic institutional funding to higher education providers in England for research and knowledge exchange (£2,309 million in 2023 to 2024)
- £696 million in dedicated skills and talents investments for the next generation of researchers, innovators and technicians, noting that almost all our investments involve significant people and skills development (£636 million in 2023 to 2024)
- £1,138 million in infrastructure, from laboratory equipment to major international research facilities (£946 million in 2023 to 2024)
- £1,362 million towards specialist institutes, centres, facilities and Catapults that provide national capabilities in specific R&I areas, including specialist equipment, expertise and knowledge (£1,427 million in 2023 to 2024)
- £443 million in collaborative challenge-led funding to address specific national and global priorities (£472 million in 2023 to 2024)
- £940 million in innovation project grants that support innovative small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) (£729 million in 2023 to 2024)
- £740 million in international partnerships to enable specific opportunities for UK researchers to collaborate with their peers globally (£688 million in 2023 to 2024)
- additionally, £12 million in public engagement activities to involve wider society in R&I, ensure that its benefits are widely shared, and inspire and engage the next generation of researchers and innovators (£12 million in 2023 to 2024)
More information on our R&I investment portfolio is available through our explainer series
See data on our awards and outputs in What we’ve funded
In 2024 to 2025 we:
- assessed over 30,550 applications for R&I funding, training grants and fellowships (29,855 in 2023 to 2024) and made 5,667 new awards (7,426 in 2023 to 2024)
- supported 4,216 organisations (4,668 in 2023 to 2024), including 125 research, academic and higher education institutions
- supported 3,304 small and medium-sized enterprises and 61 UKRI-funded institutes, centres and Catapults
- supported 29,911 individuals (29,370 in 2023 to 2024), including project co-leads (UK and international), researcher co-investigators, researcher co-leads and fellows
Since publishing the 2023 to 2024 annual report and accounts, the 2023 to 2024 data have been updated. This year we have included all funding decisions made, whereas previously only competitive awards were reported. We have also reviewed and revised previously published figures to reflect the most current data available in the UKRI Databank (UKRI’s administrative data repository).
Delivering our strategic objectives
April 2024
We signed the cross-sector concordat for the environmental sustainability of R&I practice to collectively reduce the environmental impacts of carrying out research.
We helped SMEs and innovative businesses commercialise their ideas and boost local economic growth by awarding £16 million to 101 new projects.
May 2024
In a commercial world-first, Infleqtion, in collaboration with BAE Systems and QinetiQ, successfully completed commercial flight trials of advanced quantum-based navigation systems that cannot be jammed or spoofed by hostile actors, after receiving nearly £8 million of UKRI funding delivered by Innovate UK.
The National Satellite Test Facility, the UK’s first ‘one-stop-shop’ for large satellite testing, opened its doors at the STFC-supported Harwell Space Cluster.
June 2024
Harwell Campus welcomed over 12,000 visitors to explore cutting-edge research facilities and meet the scientists and technicians behind groundbreaking research and discoveries.
We signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Australian Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation to address global challenges and enhance prosperity for the UK, Australia and the world.
July 2024
We launched five new quantum hubs through UKRI’s Technology Missions Fund to harness quantum technologies for health care, computing, national security and critical infrastructure.
We awarded 68 new Future Leaders Fellows £104 million to lead research into global issues and commercialise their innovations in the UK.
August 2024
BBSRC and Innovate UK announced their £15 million investment in the new National Alternative Protein Innovation Centre, strengthening the UK’s leadership in this rapidly growing global market.
We announced a NERC-led £38 million Flood and Droughts Research Infrastructure investment to improve the UK’s resilience to extreme weather events.
September 2024
We announced an investment of £32.4 million for 36 projects from the first round of UKRI’s new cross research council responsive mode pilot scheme, designed to stimulate exciting new interdisciplinary research.
We celebrated the milestone of awarding £2 billion of Horizon Europe guarantee funding on behalf of DSIT, supporting researchers, innovators and businesses to tackle everything from studying bacteria in waters to artificial intelligence (AI) combating drug trafficking.
October 2024
Lord Vallance, the Minister for Science, Research and Innovation, formally opened the National Quantum Computing Centre, a new national laboratory focused on accelerating quantum computing in the UK.
AHRC launched the £80 million Research Infrastructure for Conservation and Heritage Science programme, the UK’s largest ever conservation and heritage science programme, which has already secured nearly £1 million in further funding and is set to boost North West England’s economy by £30 million in gross value added.
November 2024
We announced over £500 million in doctoral landscape awards and doctoral focal awards across BBSRC, EPSRC and NERC, to train the next generation of researchers for a diverse range of careers, both in research and innovation and across the public and private sectors.
We celebrated the fifth anniversary of UKRI North America’s expansion to include Canada, and five years of developing partnerships, nurturing talent and facilitating groundbreaking research between both countries.
December 2024
STFC won the 2024 industry-team project award for outstanding support for space tech start-ups at the Sir Arthur Clarke Awards, enabling entrepreneurs to transform ambitious ideas into viable businesses.
The Medical Research Council (MRC) launched two new £50 million Centres of Research Excellence, to develop transformative new advanced therapeutics for currently untreatable diseases.
January 2025
A new report revealed that MRC-funded research had generated spin-out companies with an estimated economic value of over £6.1 billion, created more than 3,800 jobs, and attracted £10.2 billion of external investment.
We announced an 8% increase in the minimum stipend for PhD students, starting 1 October 2025, marking the largest real-terms increase for UKRI-funded students since 2003.
February 2025
AHRC unveiled three CoSTAR labs, state-of-the-art R&D facilities advancing technology for the entertainment industries, as part of a £75.6 million national network driving innovation in the creative industries.
Two new evaluations of Research England’s knowledge exchange funding showed significant returns on investment of £14.80 for every £1 of UKRI funding via Higher Education Innovation Funds and £7.70 for every £1 invested through the Connecting Capability Fund.
March 2025
We opened a £9 million proof-of-concept funding opportunity to turn world-class research into market-leading products and services, following an independent review of university spin-outs published in November 2023.
Through ESRC, we announced the renewal of £9.2 million funding for the Centre for Economic Performance to continue its policy-focused research, and over £10 million for the Centre for the Microeconomic Analysis of Public Policy to study the impact of government policy on individuals and businesses.
Risk summary
We use effective risk management to support delivery against the objectives and priorities identified in our strategy. Our goal, through early identification and active management of risks, is to anticipate uncertainties that may impact the delivery of priorities, undertake relevant and timely assessments, plan mitigations and manage issues (should they arise) with an agile and effective response.
Our approach to managing our principal risks includes a robust schedule of deep-dive evaluations of each of our principal risks in our monthly ExCo meetings.
These deep dives enable the ExCo to scrutinise the risk elements and the measures we are taking to reduce risk. Through these dives, we analyse the flight path of each risk and track the planned activity from residual score through to our target, where the risk is expected to come within our risk appetite.
A summary of our principal risks is presented in the heatmap below, including risk titles to indicate the types of risk. The Risk and Performance section of this report provides more information about the nature of these risks and how they are being managed.
Our principal risk areas include:
- UKRI staff capability and capacity (high likelihood, high impact, risk target score medium)
- financial sustainability of the UK research system (high likelihood, high impact, risk target score medium)
- failure to deliver against UKRI environmental sustainability and greening government commitments (high likelihood, medium impact, risk target score low)
- effectiveness of UKRI systems and IT infrastructure (high likelihood, medium impact, risk target score medium)
- failure to deliver the benefits of UKRI’s organisational change portfolio (medium likelihood, very high impact, risk target score medium)
- trusted research and innovation (medium likelihood, high impact, risk target score medium)
- failure to influence and respond to changes in the policy landscape (medium likelihood, high impact, risk target score medium)
- managing UKRI’s strategic direction to achieve UKRI’s intended impact (medium likelihood, high impact, risk target score medium)
- major gap or failure in our internal control environment (medium likelihood, medium impact, risk target score low)
Financial overview
UKRI’s expenditure is reported on two different bases in this Annual Report and Accounts:
- The Consolidated Statement of Comprehensive Net Expenditure presents net expenditure of £9.9 billion for the UKRI Group. The expenditure is calculated following accounting standards and guidance which are explained in more detail in Note 1 to the financial statements, and on a similar basis to those rules applied by organisations internationally.
- The Outturn against Budget is £9.8 billion. These figures are calculated in accordance with HM Treasury’s budgeting framework. The figures used in this Annual Report have been prepared on this basis. There is a difference between these two bases primarily due to additions to Property, Plant and Equipment of £201 million that are capitalised, rather than being in the Statement of Comprehensive Net Expenditure, but which have a budgetary impact.
Table 1: Outturn against budget 2024 to 2025
| UKRI 2024-25 budget allocation | Full year outturn (£ million) | Full year budget (£ million) | Variance to outturn (£ million) | Variance to outturn (%) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| UK research base | 7,230.7 | 7,302.0 | 71.3 | 1.0% |
| Core research | 5,290.2 | 5,245.7 | (44.5) | -0.8% |
| Non core research | 1,940.5 | 2,056.3 | 115.8 | 5.6% |
| R&D other | 525.4 | 438.6 | (86.8) | -19.8% |
| Core innovation | 940.3 | 978.0 | 37.6 | 3.8% |
| Core capital allocation | 8,696.4 | 8,718.5 | 22.1 | 0.3% |
| Core Innovation: DfT Zero emission HGV technologies | 80.1 | 80.0 | (0.1) | -0.1% |
| ODA | 18.4 | 19.4 | 1.0 | 5.3% |
| DSIT managed programmes | 275.2 | 310.2 | 35.0 | 11.3% |
| EU programmes | 457.0 | 461.7 | 4.6 | 1.0% |
| Ringfenced capital allocation | 830.6 | 871.3 | 40.6 | 4.7% |
| Grand total capital allocation | 9,527.0 | 9,589.8 | 62.8 | 0.7% |
| Innovation loans | 25.1 | 12.0 | (13.1) | -109.1% |
| Other financial transactions | 1.7 | 2.0 | 0.3 | 17.3% |
| Ringfenced resource budget | 219.5 | 245.9 | 26.4 | 10.8% |
| Annually managed expenditure | 5.8 | 116.5 | 110.7 | 95.0% |
| Total allocation | 9,779.1 | 9,966.3 | 187.1 | 1.9% |
Table notes: table 1 provides a summary of UKRI’s outturn against budget. UKRI has a financial management target to deliver an outturn that is not overspent and no more than 1% underspent against its core capital allocation.
The table excludes £347 million of spend within the UK research base, where UKRI increased expenditure at the request of DSIT to manage the overall departmental group position. Expenditure was increased by rephasing of Research England quality-related research (QR) funding payments to higher education institutions across the academic year such that they fell into the 2024 to 2025 financial year. UKRI achieved an underspend of £22 million against the Core Capital allocation. This equates to a 0.3% variance, which is consistent with the financial performance throughout the Spending Review and is in line with the financial management target.
Table 2: Outturn during Spending Review 2021 period
| UKRI allocation headings | Full year outturn 2024-25 (£ million) | Full year outturn 2023-24 (£ million) | Full year outturn 2022-23 (£ million) | Full year outturn 2021-22 (£ million) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| UK research base | 7,230.7 | 7,044.8 | 6,786.8 | 6,713.4 |
| Core research | 5,290.2 | 5,188.8 | 4,881.9 | 4,860.5 |
| Non core research | 1,940.5 | 1,855.9 | 1,904.9 | 1,852.9 |
| R&D other | 525.4 | 555.0 | 485.8 | 461.4 |
| Core innovation | 940.3 | 838.8 | 676.4 | 643.4 |
| Core capital allocation | 8,696.4 | 8,438.5 | 7,949.0 | 7,818.2 |
| Core Innovation: DfT Zero emission HGV technologies | 80.1 | 14.7 | 0.1 | 0.0 |
| ODA | 18.4 | 51.1 | 118.9 | 131.9 |
| DSIT managed programmes | 275.2 | 150.0 | 445.7 | 378.0 |
| EU programmes | 457.0 | 359.3 | 531.1 | 5.9 |
| Ringfenced capital allocation | 830.6 | 575.1 | 1,095.7 | 515.8 |
| Grand total capital allocation | 9,527.0 | 9,013.7 | 9,044.8 | 8,334.0 |
| Innovation loans | 25.1 | 19.8 | 15.6 | 62.3 |
| Other financial transactions | 1.7 | 2.0 | 1.5 | (20.3) |
| Ring-fenced resource budget | 219.5 | 250.7 | 191.2 | 203.5 |
| Annually managed expenditure | 5.8 | (29.7) | 28.2 | 120.0 |
| Total allocation | 9,779.1 | 9,256.4 | 9,281.2 | 8,699.5 |
The UK research base outturn has stayed broadly consistent across the three-year spending review period.
The increase of £258 million in the UK research base in year 2023 to 2024 compared to year 2022 to 2023 was driven by core research spend, in particular a £206 million increase in International funding.
The increase of £186 million between year 2023 to 2024 and year 2024 to 2025 was largely driven by an increase in spend of £210 million in strategic research and £84 million in quality-related research (QR) funding, both within core research.
Funding areas within non-core research also contributed to this increase on prior years’ spend, driven by infrastructure fund, with an £104 million increase on last year’s spend.
The research and development (R&D) ‘other’ ring-fence increased spend from year 2022 to 2023, to year 2023 to 2024, mainly driven by increases within the Technology Missions Fund, Levelling Up Programme and Faraday Institution.
Additionally, spend in some R&D Other areas has increased from year 2023 to 2024, to year 2024 to 2025, most notably in the Technology Missions Fund (£140 million spend increase) and Levelling Up-Innovation Accelerators (£31 million spend increase). The Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund spend has reduced through the Spending Review, as the fund has come to a close at the end of 2024 to 2025.
In Spending Review 2021, our core innovation budget received a significant, specific uplift in funding. It was expected that core innovation spend would total £2.4 billion between year 2022 to 2023 and year 2024 to 2025. Actual spend across this period came to £2.5 billion, with spend between year 2023 to 2024 and year 2024 to 2025 increasing by £102 million due to the introduction of funding in areas such as net zero, health and digital.
Part of core innovation, Department for Transport (DfT) zero emission heavy goods vehicle technologies, is strictly ring-fenced and is reported separately. Spend in this area has increased year-on-year during the Spending Review period as planned.
Official Development Assistance (ODA) expenditure has decreased through the Spending Review period, landing at £18.9 million in 2024 to 2025. In 2022, the Government announced that both the Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF) and Newton Fund would be discontinued. The replacement was announced as the International Science Partnerships Fund (ISPF), which is a blend of ODA and non-ODA funding and sits under the DSIT Managed Programmes ring-fence. The reduction in ODA expenditure across Spending Review 2021 reflects GCRF and Newton portfolios coming to an end and in line with expectations.
Managed Programmes outturn decreased from year 2022 to 2023 to year 2023 to 2024, as a result of the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) being split into three new departments. The Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) has continued the majority of UKRI’s funding, but this has resulted in the cost of most programmes managed by the Department for Business and Trade (DBT) and Department for Energy Security and net zero to move to an invoicing arrangement, rather than UKRI receiving a budget allocation.
£64 million of the DSIT Managed Programme spend in 2023 to 2024 was in relation to new funding for the AI Research Resource (AIRR). The overall DSIT Managed Programmes spend increased in 2024 to 2025, with AIRR spend increasing to £131 million in 2024 to 2025, and spend for ISPF (ODA and non-ODA combined) increasing by £46 million.
UK association to the Horizon Europe programme was granted in September 2023. Association means that UK organisations are able to bid into Horizon Europe calls, certain that all successful UK applicants will be covered for the remainder of the programme either through the UK’s association, or through the UK guarantee for applications submitted ahead of association, which is being delivered by UKRI.
In 2023 to 2024, UKRI increased its spend under the Horizon Europe Guarantee to £291 million, due to the significant increase in the onboarding of grants from Horizon Europe. This increased again in 2024 to 2025, to £440.5 million as these projects ramped up their activity. The EU programmes heading also includes spend for Copernicus, which has stayed broadly consistent across year 2023 to 2024 and year 2024 to 2025.
In addition, Innovate UK (IUKL) expenditure increased from year 2022 to 2023 to year 2023 to 2024, and again in 2024 to 2025 due to an increased portfolio. The Innovation Loans variance of £13 million represents solely the drawdown of new loans but excludes capital repayments. Capital repayments of £8 million are shown under the ring-fenced resource budget line.
Offsetting the overspend in Innovation Loans with the loan’s repayment line would present a net spend variance of £5 million. This has been caused by factors outside IUKL’s control (such as slower capital repayments by borrowers than forecast) and also a surrender of receipts of £2.1 million to HM Treasury’s Consolidated Fund being interest on Future Economy loans and excess loan receipts over operational expenditure.
UKRI councils' and programmes investments 2024 to 2025
Investments from councils and cross-UKRI programmes include:
- core AHRC: £77 million
- core BBBSRC: £322 million
- core EPSRC: £641 million
- core ESRC: £134 million
- core Innovate UK: £919 million
- core MRC: £604 million
- core NERC: £320 million
- core Research England: £2,006 million
- core STFC: £608 million
- existing time-limited commitments: £136 million
- collective talent funding: £696 million
- infrastructure programmes: £1,138 million
- existing cross-UKRI strategic programmes: £540 million
- new cross-UKRI strategic programmes: £439 million
- centrally managed funding: £156 million
- cross-cutting clusters: £43 million