First Advisory Council in UK unveiled during Cambridge visit from science minister Sir Patrick Vallance
The minister for science, Sir Patrick Vallance, was in Cambridge last week for the unveiling of the first-ever advisory council for a UK city.
The council, whose mission is to reinforce “Cambridge’s ambition to be at the centre of global technology and innovation”, has been established by Innovate Cambridge and is chaired by Professor Dame Ottoline Leyser, chief executive of UK Research and Innovation (UKRI).
The advisory council’s members include Baroness Sally Morgan, master of Fitzwilliam College and chair of Cambridge University Hospitals; Roxanne Varza, director of Station F; Tim Rowe, founder and CEO of Cambridge Innovation Center in Cambridge, Massachusettets; and entrepreneur and investor Hermann Hauser.
The world-leading expertise is intended to deliver “a globally leading, inclusive innovation ecosystem including policy, investment, corporate and tech”.
The council “will catalyse the Cambridge ecosystem’s potential to deliver substantial societal, environmental and economic benefits regionally and nationally in line with the Innovate Cambridge Strategy and in response to the UK government’s Industrial Strategy plans, to provide jobs for the future and improve people’s everyday lives”.
Targets have been set for the next 10 years. They include doubling the rate of unicorn creation, doubling venture capital investment, creating twice as many science and innovation companies, and generating 60,000 net new direct jobs “to ensure Cambridge and the UK are globally competitive”.
“Cambridge represents a unique convergence of scientific excellence, entrepreneurial spirit and cross-disciplinary collaboration,” said Dame Leyser, who is also a Regius professor of botany at the University of Cambridge. “The Innovation Advisory Council wants to harness the city and region’s strong foundations to establish the UK as a global leader for responsible tech progress that creates inclusive opportunities and benefits, locally, nationally and globally.”
Other advisory council members include Prof Zoubin Ghahramani, VP at Google DeepMind and professor of information engineering, University of Cambridge; Prof Deborah Prentice, vice-chancellor, University of Cambridge; Michael Chen, CEO and co-founder, Nuclera; Shaun Grady, chair, AstraZeneca UK; and Olu Orugboh, chair, Cambridge Wireless.
Dr Diarmuid O’Brien, chief executive of Innovate Cambridge and pro-vice-chancellor for innovation, University of Cambridge, said: “Cambridge is already a hotbed of research and development.
“By working together, we can harness its innovative spirit to accelerate groundbreaking research into new technologies and medicines that will benefit people worldwide and deliver economic growth to our city, region, and the entire UK.”
As part of Lord Vallance’s encouragement for the advisory council’s mission, the science minister delivered the 2025 Wilson Lecture at Fitzwilliam College.
The sold-out talk was titled ‘Where does Innovation Happen?’.
Attendee Jason Ward said the talk emphasised three factors: innovation starts with curiosity, having a product and risk-taking, and determination.
He added of the UK’s chief scientific adviser during Covid: “Lord Vallance’s point that the pandemic pushed researchers to work together to answer specific necessary questions resonated a lot – we must not forget what it showed us we could do when we needed to.”
During his visit to the region, Lord Vallance met with mayor of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Nik Johnson and local leaders. The meeting at the West Hub on Thursday (March 20) considered key challenges holding back future economic growth, including infrastructure, housing and skills.
Lord Vallance updated the group on his ambitions for the controversial Cambridge to Oxford Arc and his early priorities.
“By backing our strengths in the Corridor,” said Lord Vallance, “we can boost economic growth across the country, unlocking up to £78bn for our economy, and deliver on our Plan for Change.”
Dr Johnson said: “There is a real ambition locally to drive growth in a way that is sustainable and inclusive, and which supports the government’s focus on long-term economic renewal.”
“The Government’s commitment to the Oxford-Cambridge Growth Corridor is welcome, as is its determination to invest in the infrastructure that will make this growth work, such as transport, housing, and water security.”
