UCI News
Powering Ideas to Innovation: New UCI report provides flagship analysis of the new UK Spinout Register
10th June 2025
UCI publishes a new report providing the first flagship analysis of the UK university Spinout Register. Through Research England’s national knowledge exchange metrics programme, UCI have provided expertise on the vision, and design and development of HESA’s Spinout Register, published last week. Using the data underlying the Spinout Register and through further curation, cleaning and linking to additional information on spinout companies, the UCI analysis provides key insights on the significance, structure and dynamics of the UK spinout ecosystem.
New report from UCI exploring the evolution of research and innovation policy for regional economic growth
11th April 2025
UCI has published a report aiming to distil key theoretical and policy insights concerning how research and innovation policy interface with regional economic development processes. The report provides key insights that underpinned UCI's recent reports presenting a framework for better capturing the potential roles and contributions of university knowledge exchange in strengthening regional economic growth.
UCI’s response to the UK Government’s Industrial Strategy Green Paper
20th December 2024
UCI was pleased to contribute to the UK Government’s consultation on the Industrial Strategy Green Paper. The published note presents UCI’s response, emphasising the significant contributions of universities to drive innovation-led economic growth, as well as highlighting some key challenges when adopting a sector-led approach.
Unlocking new opportunities with improved national spinout data…
24th September 2024
UCI publish a new report, written in partnership with Research England, setting out the vision and approach for developing a system to improve university spinout data using a Spinout Register.
UCI and CSTI host workshop in Cambridge on the Future of Challenge-Driven Partnerships
10th July 2024
Working with the US-based University Industry Demonstration Partnership (UIDP), Tomas Ulrichsen (UCI) and Eoin O’Sullivan (CSTI) from the IfM organised an international workshop looking at what needs to be done to enable partners from across the research and innovation landscape to come together with a sense of urgency to tackle major societal grand challenges.
UCI delivers keynotes and workshop at the Praxis Auril Conference 2024
6th June 2024
Members of the UCI team attended the Praxis Auril (soon to be Knowledge Exchange UK) annual conference in Blackpool. Valeria Ramirez, UCI Research Associate, held a workshop on meaningful metrics, and Tomas Ulrichsen, UCI Director, provided two keynotes on the importance of data and evidence on knowledge exchange.
UCI and IfM Engage publish report on commercialising social science research
17th April 2024
UCI co-authors report with IfM Engage on commercialising social science research, capturing key insights on the types of opportunities, journey involved, and barriers and enablers. It develops a prototype tool for understanding project progress towards success deployment.
New UCI report reveals detailed insights on key trends in UK spinout production and success
7th March 2024
A new UCI report reveals detailed insights on key trends in UK spinout production and the influence of university founding equity on initial investments. The report demonstrates the importance of university spinouts for the UK’s ambitions to become a more science and technology-driven economy. Analysis of UK and US spinout data finds that UK spinout production, controlling for the size of research base, is comparable to that of the US, and points to further research needed on the ability of the UK to retain value from its spinouts. It also confirms a very weak relationship between university founding equity and initial investment.
The Policy Evidence Unit for University Commercialisation and Innovation expands
11th December 2023
By Thea Bjøranger, IfM Engage
It’s a busy time for the Policy Evidence Unit for University Commercialisation and Innovation (UCI) at the IfM. Since early October, the team has doubled in size from three to six members – with a further team member joining in January – and is now ready to take on larger projects.
The legal complexities of spinning out: UCI publish expert insight paper
8th September 2023
Mark Anderson, an English solicitor (attorney) and legal scholar with significant experience in intellectual property law and spinout transactions, explores the legal complexities and issues that shape the spinout process and the approaches universities develop to support it.
Busting Myths: the reality of UK university approaches to spinouts
9th November 2022
New UCI report sets out in detail the reality of current UK university approaches to taking equity in spinouts to create an evidence baseline for policymakers and others seeking to investigate how to strengthen the UK research and innovation system to produce more ‘high-potential’ spinouts.
UCI report launched investigating the ongoing effects of the Covid-19 pandemic on the ability of universities to contribute to innovation through the crisis and into the recovery
22nd July 2022
Building on UCI's 2021 COVID report, this new report, led by UCI with support from the National Centre for Universities and Business (NCUB) looks at the ongoing effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the ability of universities to contribute to innovation through the crisis and into the recovery. It also explores how universities are responding to the ‘shock’ of the pandemic, and their potential roles in helping to drive an innovation-led recovery.
Unleashing the Potential of Partnerships to Tackle Climate Change
29th October 2021
Universities – working in close partnership with industry, government, investors, community groups and others – have the potential to play a critical role in accelerating innovation to find practical solutions to help us reach net zero.
First UCI report launched examining the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic on how UK universities contribute to innovation!
27th January 2021
This report – led by the new University Commercialisation and Innovation Policy Evidence Unit at the University of Cambridge with support from the UK National Centre for Universities and Business – investigates the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the ability of universities to contribute to innovation through the crisis and into the economic recovery.
