'We back British': 13 contracts awarded to homegrown UK technology companies worth £4m each
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The contracts are worth £4m each
The Ministry of Defence has awarded 13 contracts to growing British technology companies in an effort to back homegrown defence innovation.
The contracts – of up to £4m each – will see the firms develop advanced sensors, autonomous systems, secure communications, space manufacturing and simulation training for the Armed Forces. The announcement comes as Sir Keir Starmer is expected to approve an £18bn hike in defence spending, ending a months-long delay to the defence investment plan.
The Government in January launched its “defence unicorn” initiative aimed at fast-tracking contracts for small and growing tech companies. The winning businesses have done limited or no prior work with the MoD, were mostly founded in the last six years, and more than half are new to the defence sector.
Defence secretary John Healey will tell Tuesday’s Good Growth Foundation event that more defence investment must stay in the UK.
He is expected to say: “The rising defence investment under this Government comes with a fundamentally new approach. A defence dividend that boosts British industry. A ‘Back British’ pledge to boost skills, innovation and productivity. This is a fundamental shift from the failed past.”
Mr Healey will also say that the UK’s defence sector underpins wider economic stability, including investment and business confidence, and will urge private investors to support growing firms. “And as Defence Secretary, I’m determined to help grow the next generation of defence businesses,” he added.
“Alongside all 31 Nato allies, our government signed up to spend 3.5 per cent on defence by 2035. MoD estimates this means over half a million Brits will work for a defence firm in a decade’s time. Those companies of the 2030s don’t start then, they start today. Government is acting to back British innovators for the next generation of defence jobs… And I call on private investors to back them too.”
The Labour-leaning think tank hosting the event said in a report published this week that defence should be used to drive jobs and prosperity in order to build stronger public support, which is “politically fragile” as defence is not seen as a top priority issue.
Good Growth Foundation director Praful Nargund said: “Today’s announcements are a step towards bringing defence home: backing the British innovators who will build our sovereign capability, keep the returns here, and create the defence industry Britain needs for a more dangerous world.”
He said small and medium-sized firms are too often “locked out of defence contracts” while “defence investment flows overseas,” and that “only by backing SMEs that you build the domestic supply chain resilience that sovereign capability depends upon”. The winning firms will support jobs in places including London, Devon, Edinburgh, Newport in Wales and West Yorkshire.
The founder of one of them, Chris Isaac of SpaceAM, said the fund had led to the hiring of “six new staff, our first commercial labs operational, top London VCs (venture capital firms) lining up to invest, and the ability to scale at pace with confidence”.