The UK’s Golden Triangle life sciences market is the third strongest in the world, according to Savills’ Global Index.
The consultancy examined 30 locations based on the depth of their life sciences talent pools, research and development investment and output, fundraising levels, business environment, cost of living and lifestyle factors, and property affordability.
The combined attractiveness of London, Cambridge and Oxford lagged only that of Boston and San Francisco, which ranked first and second, respectively.
Tom Mellows, head of UK science at Savills, said: “The Golden Triangle has taken some big strides forward this year and further consolidated its position as the UK’s centre of life sciences activity. It is also, according to our index, the leading location in Europe for the industry.”
The Golden Triangle cluster is home to multidisciplinary talent, global leading academia, a deep funding environment and attractive lifestyle for talent. It also benefits from the UK recently rejoining Horizon Europe, the €95.5bn (£79.8bn) collaborative research programme created by the European Union.
When it came to talent pipeline and cost of talent, Savills ranked the Golden Triangle as the second-best market in the world, behind Beijing.
In terms of funding, the Golden Triangle ranked third behind San Francisco and Boston.
However, the Golden Triangle fell outside of the top five when it came to government spending in research and development, ease of doing business and cost of living and property.
Savills also noted that when it came to research intensity – measured as patent-filing activity and article publication in relation to size of workforce – Cambridge alone led.
Elsewhere in the UK, Manchester sat at number 25 in the index as the market offers access to renowned universities, numerous pharmaceutical and biotech companies and innovative start-ups. However, investments from venture capital are relatively low.
Savills also highlighted Edinburgh and Glasgow in Scotland as emerging hotspots which – while outside the main Index – have the potential to grow, as they offer possible cost advantages to life sciences occupiers, without sacrificing access to highly skilled workforce and academic institutions.
Rick Schuham, chief executive of global occupier services at Savills, said: “In a fast-changing world, life sciences occupiers are continually reassessing how real estate strategies can help them to stay ahead of the competition by accessing the right talent, supporting cost optimisation and driving environmental sustainability. It’s the former, however, that’s increasingly important in selecting sites: the industry is competing ever more with others for key talent in data science, automation, Gen AI and advanced robotics, to deliver data analysis, drug discovery and laboratory optimisation.
“Many life sciences firms will therefore choose to locate in the top destinations in our index to access this specialist talent, balancing the considerable outlay against the promise of accelerating future growth and driving process innovation for cost advantage. Others, however, may pay more consideration to the ability to compete for the best multidisciplinary talent in a market, and therefore developing life sciences hub locations may be more appropriate.”
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