Three successful years of Digital Catapult’s role in IoTUK

As the Digital Catapult’s involvement in the internet of things UK (IoT UK) programme draws to an end this month, we celebrate over three and a half successful years of our work in the programme.

Launched in 2015 by DCMS, IoT UK’s aim is to help advance the UK development of the internet of things for economic and social benefit. This included a programme of activities led by Digital Catapult in partnership with Future Cities Catapult.

We have achieved a lot over the past three and a half years in collaboration with a number of our research and programme partners.

Highlights include watching the Manchester city demonstrator, CityVerve, take shape; working with leading academics in PETRAS, a research hub focused on security and trust; supporting two hardware accelerators, Startupbootcamp and R/GA Ventures; and two health and social care test beds in Surrey (dementia) and the West of England (diabetes).

With support from ODI Leeds and The DataCity, we created the The IoT Nation Database, which as of the 31st July 2018, included details of over 1,344 internet of things (IoT) organisations in the UK; helping to provide a snapshot of the current state of the businesses and organisations that make up the UK’s sector.

Through Digital Catapult’s Boost programmes, workshops and hack and pitch programmes, we have helped support the adoption of high quality IoT technologies throughout businesses and the public sector. In total our work has supported over 160 startups, including four of the most innovative in the IoT sector: Beringar, LettUs Grow, See.Sense and Sensing Feeling.

We also met with and attended over 48 international delegations and engagements with countries including South Korea, Japan, the US and Germany. We used the international platform of 2016’s Mobile World Congress event in Barcelona to promote the work of the programme and the UK’s IoT industry.

While the Digital Catapult’s role in the IoT UK Programme is now concluding, work will continue through our partners and the businesses we’ve supported. We look forward to watching them grow and succeed and we’re sure there will be some exciting projects developing in the pipeline!

Thank you to everyone who’s joined us on this incredible journey, collaborating to advance IoT across the UK. To keep updated with Digital Catapult’s Open Calls and ongoing events programme, sign up to our newsletter here.