Composites for UK Strategic Advantage: Granular-Level Insights into Enabling Technologies for Ceramic Matrix Composites & Metal Matrix Composites

A joint workshop hosted by the Centre for Science, Technology & Innovation Policy (CSTI), Institute for Manufacturing (IfM), University of Cambridge, in collaboration with the UK Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT).

Overview

Advanced composite materials are increasingly recognised as critical enabling technologies for the UK's future industrial competitiveness. Ceramic Matrix Composites (CMCs) and Metal Matrix Composites (MMCs) offer unique combinations of lightweighting, thermal resilience, mechanical strength and performance that can unlock opportunities across aerospace, defence, nuclear energy and other strategically important sectors.

To better understand the UK's position and future opportunities, CSTI in collaboration with DSIT convened a multi-stakeholder workshop in January 2026. The workshop brought together experts from industry, academia, research and technology organisations, and government to identify promising use cases, critical technologies, enabling capabilities and supply chain challenges associated with CMCs and MMCs.   The discussion was guided by the Technology Strata Framework developed by CSTI. It provided a common standardised language for technology and capability mapping, enabling participants to systematically identify opportunities, bottlenecks and future priorities across value chains.

The workshop report summarises key evidence and insights and describes the workshop design in detail. Download the report here.

Key Evidence and Insights

The workshop highlighted several important findings:

• Strong UK opportunity: Participants identified significant potential for the UK to establish leadership positions across CMC and MMC value chains within the next 5–10 years, building on already existing internationally competitive strengths.
• Priority application areas: High-potential use cases were identified in civil aerospace, defence, and nuclear fission and fusion applications.
• Demand signals are critical: Strong and sustained market pull from OEMs, government programmes and procurement initiatives was identified as essential for accelerating commercial deployment.
• Need for manufacturing readiness: Participants consistently highlighted the importance of developing, standardising and scaling manufacturing processes to improve industrial adoption.
• Certification and standards gap: Early development of design allowables, test methodologies, certification pathways and industry standards could significantly strengthen UK competitiveness.
• Key challenges include: need for scale-up facilities and capital investment, workforce development, supply chain resilience and ecosystem coordination.

Technology Strata Framework-Based Workshop Design

The workshop utilised the Technology Strata Framework as a guiding framework to create a shared understanding of technologies and capabilities across participants from different sectors and disciplines and a more systematic approach to evidence gathering.

The workshop followed a structured facilitation process:

1. Identification of high-potential UK use cases.
2. Selection of an exemplar use case at each table.
3. Mapping of key technologies using the Technology Strata Framework.
4. Identification of enabling technologies and complementary capabilities.
5. Cross-table validation of common and specialised technologies.
6. Mapping of key organisations and value chain actors.
7. Identification of supply chain bottlenecks, gaps and future risks.

The Technology Strata Framework played a central role in improving the quality and consistency of evidence gathered throughout the workshop. Specifically, it:

• Enabled participants from different backgrounds to work from a common analytical structure.
• Reduced ambiguity by standardising technology and capability terminology.
• Encouraged systematic consideration of technologies across different levels of the innovation system.
• Supported identification of cross-cutting capabilities shared across multiple sectors and composite systems.
• Connected evidence on actors, skills, facilities and supply chain challenges directly to specific technological capabilities.
• Generated evidence that can be compared, aggregated and expanded in future studies.

The workshop strongly validated this approach, demonstrating that standardised technology and capability mapping can serve as a powerful foundation for broader ecosystem and supply chain analysis.

About the Report

This report presents:

• Detailed findings from the workshop discussions.
• Potential priority UK use cases for ceramic and metal matrix composites.
• Technology and capability maps developed by participants.
• Identification of key organisations, actors and value chain bottlenecks.
• Cross-cutting insights on scale-up, standards, skills and manufacturing readiness.
• A review of relevant literature on CMCs and MMCs.
• Reflections on the workshop methodology and lessons learned.

Importantly, the report also reflects on the methodology itself, providing practical guidance and recommendations for organisations seeking to apply the Technology Strata Framework in future evidence-gathering, roadmapping or technology foresight exercises.