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Partnering for Prosperity

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Spanning the heart of the UK, the Midlands is the largest regional economy outside London. The Midlands Engine partnership represents 11 million people and 816,000 businesses — an economy worth over £246 billion per year.

Working in partnership with regional firms and public sector bodies, we focus on tackling the things that really matter in our region to drive prosperity for our communities and businesses.

Our members include 18 local authorities and the West Midlands Combined Authority, nine local enterprise partnerships and our region’s 20 world-class universities. We also work with a rapidly growing number of private sector partners, collaborating and investing together to achieve our shared aims for regional success.

Together, we make sure the Midlands voice is heard and act as a positive agent for economic, social and environmental change, to benefit every single part of our region. We do this through shared intent, collaborative investment and presenting a strong, unified voice, direct to government.

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Enabling smart public services and digitalised business is a key focus to promote regional competitiveness. As we drive digital levelling up across our region, we are creating a network of digitised businesses and exceptional digital skills-bridging the ‘digital poverty’ divide caused by the pandemic.

Work across the Midlands Engine partnership has delivered the first pan-regional connectivity map, tracking 4G, 5G and fibre + gigabit connections. It’s a powerful evidence base that will support faster infrastructure delivery and help secure private and public sector investment.

The Midlands is a centre of excellence in digital innovation. Home to the UK’s first multi-city 5G test bed, enabling 5G connectivity is worth £5 billion to the Midlands economy over the next five years and a further £15.9 billion over the subsequent five years

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The Midlands is the largest regional economy outside London

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Read the latest case studies, reports, and briefings about our region’s journey to super connectivity.

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Digital

Oct 11 2024

Midlands Investment success stories: Cyber & Data Technology

The cyber and digital sectors are changing at rapid pace, but the Midlands is proving itself equal to the challenge. Growing clusters across the region are driving innovative responses to modern opportunities and difficulties, with the cyber and data science sector alone representing £10.5bn in GVA and 128,700 jobs. With Creative Quarters established across six cities, a ‘Cyber Valley’ community that is home to the highest concentration of cyber businesses in the UK outside of London, and Warwickshire’s ‘Silicon Spa’ cluster responsible for 25% of the UK’s video game development output, the Midlands has been establishing itself as the place to be.