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February 2025
The Solent region boasts significant strengths that position it as a burgeoning tech hub in the UK. Southampton and Portsmouth in particular have emerged as key innovation clusters in areas such as AI, gaming and software development.
Organisations like the Southampton Science Park, Future Worlds and SetSquared provide resources and foster a collaborative environment, enabling tech businesses to thrive.
The region’s academic institutions, including the University of Southampton, Southampton Solent University, the University of Portsmouth and the South Coast Institute of Technology play a pivotal role in driving the region’s tech growth. By collaborating with industry leaders these partnerships not only spawn new innovations but also support the commercialisation of technology.
The region’s expertise in defence and maritime industries is another major asset, with major sector players such as Chemring, QinetiQ, BAE Systems and Lockheed Martin having a strong presence. Newer entrants such as maritime robotics experts Ocean Infinity are also starting to make their mark worldwide.
Fintech is also an area in which Solent is emerging as a key regional player. A recent example is Bournemouth-based mortgage technology firm Twenty7tec, which raised £16.5m in a funding round in September 2024. Not to mention the multinational wealth manager, Quilter, which has an office in Southampton. The firm plays a significant role in the fintech sector in the Solent region through its strategic partnerships and acquisitions of the likes of fintech mortgage lender Gen H and investment app NuWealth.
In the Solent hub of Southampton, the University of Southampton has been campaigning to establish the city as a centre for AI excellence, which Prof Mark E. Smith, president and vice-chancellor, has described as “a perfect example of how a university can use its role to show the transformational impact world-leading research can have on local communities and regional prosperity”. The University also leads a £31m research consortium, Responsible AI UK, that has brought together experts to create an international research and innovation institute to create trustworthy and secure AI that responds to the needs of society.
Professor Dame Wendy Hall,
Director of the University of Southampton’s Web Science Institute
Southampton, AI City of Excellence is about making AI work from the grassroots up.
We will tap into the diversity of great minds and creative thinkers across the City – its people, businesses, local leaders, health, education, and cultural experts – to work with the University’s outstanding students and researchers specialising in AI.
Together we can unlock the potential of AI to improve lives, service delivery, economic growth and innovation for the whole City.
Stakeholders in the region also point to its friendly and collaborative culture wherein its participants are enthused and want to grow together, including recent initiatives such as Women in Tech Hampshire, which was launched in January 2024, and Hampshire AI, which was launched in January 2025.
Sheilah Mackie,
Legal Director,
Womble Bond Dickinson
Collaboration between academic institutions and industry has played a pivotal role in the region’s tech growth. The University of Southampton, for example, has partnered with tech companies to drive research and development in areas such as artificial intelligence and cybersecurity. These partnerships have led to groundbreaking innovations and the commercialisation of new technologies.
Tech companies in the Solent region face several challenges despite the area’s strong potential for growth. Though there is plenty of cutting-edge research across its universities, there is difficulty in translating academic and policy expertise in areas such as AI and emerging tech into practical applications, though a handful of institutions such as the Solent Institute for Technology and the Web Science Institute aim to address this along with the proposed AI City of Excellence project.
Moreover, regional productivity issues persist, with research from the Solent Local Enterprise Partnership finding workforce productivity in the area was 1.5% lower than the British average and nearly 7% lower than the average for the South East. The group noted that this was in part down to an ageing population.
Funding constraints further exacerbate these challenges, with local firms suffering from a lack of visibility seen in nearby tech hubs such as Cambridge and Oxford. A greater number of high-profile funding rounds or exits could help provide a halo effect for the region.
It has been suggested by local stakeholders that the region has lacked the risk appetite necessary to make greater strides in growing the tech industry. Calls have therefore been made to support a high-risk high reward approach from VCs.
Ben Clark,
Director,
Future Worlds
It is unreasonable to hope for Silicon Valley style outcomes without buying into the high risk, high reward approach of the venture capital industry. To transform the Solent region, we must fund and enable daring individuals and teams who are pursuing outlandish ideas with high levels of uncertainty and frequent failures. Through doing so, we can unleash the startups with the greatest potential to change the world, particularly those in areas that are critical for societal progression, such as AI and photonics.
