The Future of UK Spinout Production
In August's newsletter, we feature an article on spinout production from UK universities, investigating the trends we're seeing now across the country and how these might shape spinout production in the future.
Beyond this, we cover some of Corpora.ai's highlights from this month including our CEO and Co-founder, Mel Morris CBE joining Oracle on their "AI Changes Everything" podcast. Enjoy reading!
The Future of Spinout Production from UK Universities
Tracking the trends, distribution, and early warning signals shaping the future of UK Spinout Production.
The UK’s universities are centres for research excellence, with 41% of UK universities research outputs being rated as world-leading and 43% as internationally excellent[1]. They also have enormous potential to drive growth, create skilled jobs, and deliver long-term socioeconomic benefits to the UK. Part of this is through providing education and the upskilling of graduates, while the other side is through connecting research to businesses and industry to move innovation from the lab into the real-world, for example through research partnerships, intellectual property licensing, and spinout formation.
The ability of our universities to create an impact is clear. In 2021/22 core research and related commercialisation activities at Russell Group universities contributed around £37.6 billion to the UK economy and supported more than 254,000 jobs [2]. Beyond this, university spinouts established since 2010 alone have a combined enterprise value of ~£49 billion and have created around 27,000 jobs [3].
Despite this strength, a broader challenge is that strong research does not automatically translate into strong productivity growth. The UK still faces barriers in capturing value from innovation pathways. Recent reviews have argued that there is more we can do to support spin-out founders from academia, such as increasing proof-of-concept funding, commercialisation support, and better university policies for all parties involved in spin-out deals[4].
Trends in spinout formation over the decade
Spinout formation has held broadly steady over the last decade averaging 165 companies annually, peaking at 194 in 2020/21. The rate of formation grew during the pandemic. This could be due to changes in working conditions and the VC market boom [6]. Therefore, as we move back to ‘normal’ operations, a drop in spin-out formation to levels like what we observed pre-pandemic is expected and observed.
However, rather than settling at a stable level, formation has continued to fall every year since the peak down to 152 in 2024/25. This soft decline alone is not a concern, however four consecutive years of movement in one direction is worth watching, especially when we consider what the upstream data shows.
An early warning signal
The picture upstream of spinout formation is more concerning. Figure 2 tracks patent filings, an indication of a universities intent to commercialise a piece of research, against the invention disclosures made to the university, meaning the point at which a researcher presents an idea to the university as potentially commercial. Considered together, the two series indicate both the supply of ideas researchers think hold commercial potential and the willingness of universities to act on them.
For the first part of the decade, from 2015/16 to 2018/19, disclosures sat comfortably ahead of patents, with universities patenting around two thirds of disclosures. The two metrics then converged in 2020/21, over the pandemic when general laboratory research activity slowed across universities[7]. Patenting activity nonetheless increased over this window, helped by a noticeable rise in COVID-19 related filings[8]. Since the pandemic, though, the trend has turned.
We observe recovery in disclosure numbers, reaching 4,151 for 2024/25. However, patent filings have fallen to 2,779 in 2022/23, then to 2,139 in 2023/24, to this year the total being 815 as currently reported (as of 22nd July 2026). The recovery in disclosures, alongside the drop in patent filings, indicates that researchers are still coming forward with ideas, yet a smaller proportion of those ideas is being carried through to a filing. This could indicate a reduced willingness, or reduced capacity, within universities to protect and pursue commercialisation outcomes.
Deep tech spinouts dominate the spinout landscape[3], making a narrowing upstream pipeline even more concerning. This is because deep tech companies rely on a moat of intellectual property to give them exclusive rights to monetise their technology, protecting their long R&D timelines and to incentivising investment. A joint EPO and EUIPO study found that European startups holding patents were up to 6.4 times more likely to secure Series A or Series B funding than those without registered IP[9]. Therefore, a sustained decline in filings today could translate, with a lag of several years, into fewer investible spinouts tomorrow.
Spinout production by university
Behind the national picture sits a question of how many spinouts individual universities are producing. Historically, this picture has been dominated by the Golden Triangle, six institutions clustered across Oxford, Cambridge and London. Together they accounted for 45% of spinouts formed between 2013 and 2024[10]. However, an alternative question is which institutions are producing more spinouts than would be expected from the quality and size of their research base. Figure 3 shows the number of spinouts each university produced between 2020/21 and 2024/25 against its research base, expressed as spinouts per unit of research power (x100) as reported by Times Higher Education on the results of REF 2021[11].
Golden Triangle institutions still take first, second and fourth place, so their strength is not simply a function of size, they are also effective at turning their research base into spinouts. These institutions are joined by universities from beyond the golden triangle. Dundee ranks third, ahead of Oxford, and Manchester, Ulster, Newcastle, Strathclyde, Queen Mary and Queen’s University Belfast all appear in the top ten. Additionally, is it worth noting that three of the six Golden Triangle institutions do not appear at all, which suggests that a large research power is not a guarantee of producing more spinouts. This is also a function of specialisation, with London School of Economics being specialised in pure and social sciences. Moreover, the social sciences typically produce less spinouts than technology focused research[12].
The picture that emerges is more balanced than volume rankings indicate. Golden Triangle universities tend to win on absolute numbers, but other institutions are just as capable of turning their research into spinouts, which suggests the ingredients and intent for commercialisation of research are more widely distributed across the country than the headline figures represent.
Conclusions
The UK has a clear opportunity. Its universities produce world-leading research and the companies that have already spun out of that research represent tens of billions of pounds in value and tens of thousands of jobs. However, there are warning flags that cannot be ignored.
The upstream pipeline of spinout production is narrowing. Researchers are still coming forward with ideas, but the number of those ideas carried through to a patent filing has fallen. A warning flag, that if not turned around, will result in fewer investable deep tech spinouts in the future. The disclosure numbers are reassuring that the ideas are still there, however the current gap points to the willingness or capacity of universities to protect and pursue them.
Additionally, the ability to produce spinouts from a universities research base is far more widely distributed than raw volume or value would suggest, with several institutions outside the Golden Triangle converting their research base into companies at a comparable rate. This indicates, that although not having the scale of Golden Triangle institutions, other universities, can also efficiently produce spinouts from their research base, and we should learn from these examples to further spread the geography of spinout creation.
That points to where effort is best directed. The most immediate priority is the upstream pipeline, making sure universities have the proof-of-concept funding, the technology transfer capacity and the internal incentives to carry more disclosures through to filing, in line with the recommendations of the 2023 independent spinout review[4]. Alongside that sits a opportunity in the broadening geography of spinout activity by learning from institutions who produce spinouts effectively from smaller research bases. Together this will ensure our UK universities continue to fuel our economy and place us in a position to lead in the technologies of the future.
*Inclusive of both spinouts with some higher education provider ownership and other spinouts.
** Total of new Invention Patent Filings inclusive of the UK and Overseas
[1] REF 2021 Key facts. Available at: https://2021.ref.ac.uk/media/1848/ref2021_key_facts.pdf.
[2] Knuth, K. et al. (2025) The economic impact of the Russell Group universities’ R&D activities, Knowledge Exchange UK. Available at: https://www.russellgroup.ac.uk/sites/default/files/2025-02/the-economic-impact-of-rd-activities-at-russell-group-universities_feb-24.pdf.
[3] The Royal Academy of Engineering (2026) Spotlight on Spinouts 2026. Available at: https://raeng.org.uk/media/jutohvog/raeng-spotlight_on-spinouts_2026-report.pdf.
[4] Tracey, I. and Williamson, A. (2023) Independent Review of University Spin-out Companies. Available at: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6549fcb23ff5770013a88131/independent_review_of_university_spin-out_companies.pdf
[5] Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA), Business and Community Interactions – Intellectual property, start-ups, and spin-outs. Available at https://www.hesa.ac.uk/data-and-analysis/business-community/ip-and-startups.
[6] Dhawan, V., Plester, T. and Cook, D. (2025) New University spin-out Register launched, Jisc. Available at: https://www.jisc.ac.uk/blog/new-university-spin-out-register-launched.
[7] Silberner, J. (2022) Research, interrupted: How covid-19 slowed basic research, Hopkins Bloomberg Public Health. Available at: https://magazine.publichealth.jhu.edu/2022/research-interrupted-how-covid-19-slowed-basic-research.
[8] World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) (2022), COVID-19-related vaccines and therapeutics: preliminary insights on related patenting activity during the pandemic. Available at: https://www.wipo.int/edocs/pubdocs/en/wipo-pub-1075-en-covid-19-related-vaccines-and-therapeutics.pdf
[9] European Patent Office and European Union Intellectual Property Office (2023), Patents, trade marks and startup finance. Available at: https://www.euipo.europa.eu/en/publications/2023-startup-finance
[10] Ulrichsen, T. C. 2026. Investing in Success: A quantitative analysis of the structure, dynamics and links within the UK university spinout and investor ecosystem. A Technical Report for Research England. Available at: https://www.ukri.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/RE-200126-Ulrichsen-InvestinginSuccess-Report.pdf
[11] Times Higher Education (2022) REF 2021 Main Online Table . Available at: https://www.timeshighereducation.com/content/ref2021mainonlinetable
[12] Rask, M. and Thibert, C. (2025) ‘From spinout dissonance to ecosystem readiness: Scaling democratic innovation through social science entrepreneurship’, Journal of Sustainability Research, 7(4). doi:10.20900/jsr20250079.
Mel Morris CBE joins Oracle's "AI Changes Everything" podcast
Recently, Corpora's CEO and co-founder, Mel Morris CBE joined Oracle on their AI Changes Everything podcast to discuss why the future of AI isn't about replacing researchers - it's about helping them connect knowledge across disciplines, discover what others miss and accelerate innovation while protecting ideas earlier.
One key takeaway from the podcast was: Don't tell AI where to look - tell it the problem you're trying to solve. That simple shift can uncover insights from places you'd never have considered.
Watch the full podcast here.
The missing layer in the enterprise AI tech stack? Turns out it's human.
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In this new feature, Lumenai founder and CEO, Antonia Manoochehri, makes a compelling case. As workplace tasks become increasingly automated, soft skills are fast becoming the real differentiator for employers and employees alike. Yet we still measure them with decades-old personality tests and bias-prone surveys. Lumenai changes that. Its platform transforms human behaviours, values, and decision-making into structured, defensible data that's owned by the individual, opted-in by design, and ready for genuine AI-enabled insight.
Read the full article on Tech Monitor here!
Thank you for reading this months newsletter, we hope you enjoyed it and will see you again next month!
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