Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, how much funding the Government has allocated to research into (a) photonics and (b) optoelectronics in each (a) nation and (b) region of the UK in each year for which data is available.

UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) funds high quality research and innovation for BEIS as part of the Government’s wider ambition to increase the UK’s total R&D investment to 2.4% of GDP by 2027. All proposals are assessed through peer review and funding is not usually ringfenced for particular research areas or topics.

Engineering and Physical Science Research Council (EPSRC) is the primary funder of these areas within UKRI. The table below summarises the value of all current grants from EPSRC, in research and training for the relevant research portfolios: Photonic Materials, Optoelectronic Devices and a combined figure for Optical Communications and Optical Devices and Subsystems.

Please note other research is being carried out in this area, both in other UKRI councils and outside of UKRI, but we are unable to determine the monetary value of this in the time allowed.

My rt. hon. Friend Mr Chancellor of the Exchequer announced in the Spring Statement an £81 million investment in a national Extreme Photonics Application Centre in Oxfordshire. In addition, EPSRC has confirmed continued funding for two existing Centres for Doctoral Training in ICT Photonics as well as investment in a new CDT which will contribute to this area