Building Winners: The Policy Levers for Impactful Innovation (FFOpen009)

January 8, 2026

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Project overview

This project aims to foster better innovations in different places and their adoption by non-innovating companies believing innovation is a driver of growth and productivity. However, not all innovations are equal and innovative activity is uneven in the UK.

The project will explore questions such as: what some of the most impactful innovations are and, perhaps more importantly, how can policymakers help the delivery of impactful innovations?

Combining quantitative and qualitative expertise to answer these questions. Firstly, patent data will be analysed to identify widely adopted patents (our definition of impactful innovations). Secondly, interviews will be held with creators and users of impactful innovations to better understand their experiences, challenges, and perceptions of support and assess the help they received.

Project Team: read more about their work and experience via the links below

Tyler Rickard

Department for Science, Innovation and Technology

LinkedIN

Mara Sankey

Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities

Robin Polding

Department for Science, Innovation and Technology

Associated blog posts

Building winners: the policy levers for impactful innovation

This blog post was written to provide readers with the early details of the project, the aims (to contribute to the ongoing discussion on innovation policy and its role in fostering economic growth and reducing spatial inequalities to inform UK policymaking), it’s methodological approach and the outcomes hoped for.

This is an ideal place to grasp an initial understanding of the project.

Access the blog post here.

Navigating innovation and policy in uncertain times event wrap up

Dr Tasos Kitsos, Dr Dalila Ribaudo, Dr Charlotte Hoole and Pro Jun Du, held a joint dissemination event (‘Navigating innovation and policy in uncertain times’) for their IRC Flex Fund projects.

The event was a mixture of presentations from the projects teams and roundtable discussions. Check out the blog post below for a detailed summary of the event and illustrations capturing the key takeaways.

Access the blog post here.