Uploaded March 2026 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago

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BBSRC’s Executive Chair, Professor Anne Ferguson-Smith, shares the key insights from our recent engagement event at Innovate Cambridge’s The Glasshouse, which brought together stakeholders from across the East of England to exchange ideas on UKRI’s new strategy.

Key takeaways from the day’s conversations include:
- Curiosity-driven research is an important component of what we do and continued investment in this area is essential
- Focusing and prioritising on particular areas is crucial – we can’t do everything
- The new way of working across UKRI, where different research councils work together on programme boards, is why UKRI was formed
- Leveraging the East of England’s expertise to help companies scale and connect with other parts of the country
- Investing in startups and talent to drive innovation
- Developing trusted global relationships to strengthen international collaboration

Find out more in this video.

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