An acute shortage of lab space for Scotland’s vital life science industry is being tackled in Glasgow.
Glasgow City Region has launched a further £20m fund dedicated to expanding the amount of laboratory space and infrastructure across the region.
The funding is targeted at developers, site owners and consortiums which are seeking to deliver new or expanded specialist laboratory space (clean rooms, wet, dry spaces, incubator or follow on).
This is the second funding Open Call for the Health and Life Sciences Cluster following the launch in December of the Open Call for new R&D project funding proposals.
There is currently a serious shortfall in laboratory space which is restricting growth of the sector in Scotland.
The Health and Life Sciences sector in Glasgow supports over 10,000 jobs and has seen a 47 per cent increase in employment between 2019 and 2023. It is recognised to have enormous future potential, with its MedTech, BioTech, and Pharma and Biopharma-sub sectors particularly strong, and Scottish Enterprise projecting a 300 per cent growth potential in turnover in the cluster across Scotland by 2035. The Glasgow City Region accounts for almost 60 per cent of the total turnover across the country.
Susan Aitken, chair of the Glasgow City Region Cabinet and Leader of Glasgow City Council, said: “The Health and Life Sciences sector is increasingly important to Scotland’s economy and is projected to grow by three hundred per cent in the next decade. Glasgow is already at the forefront of that. To allow this dynamic sector to deliver on its potential, for companies to be able to scale-up, and to ensure more opportunities are available to new entrants, we need more quality laboratory space in the years ahead.
“This new funding recognises the importance of infrastructure to the innovation economy and compliments the recent £25m call for ambitious research and development proposals.
“It also builds on the successful partnerships with our universities and businesses to nurture this vital sector and deliver future jobs and prosperity across the city region.”
Project proposals must meet eligibility criteria and come with private sector match funding of at least 2:1 from non-public sources. Applications for funding can be made by organisations based outside of the region. But the lab space must be based within the region.
The Open Call forms part of the wider UK Government Local Innovation Partnerships Fund (LIPF) that will invest up to £500m into the development and scaling of high-potential innovation clusters across the UK.
