Project team
- Andy Cosh
- Giorgio Caselli
- Robert Hughes
Project status
Ongoing
Project dates
2014-2027
Overview
This project concerns the modelling of the growth of businesses in the local region and providing the data for Cambridge Cluster Insights. It also involves feeding the results into a regional spatial forecasting model used by researchers at the Department of Architecture at the University of Cambridge to study infrastructure constraints and solutions for the regional economy.
Project team Dr Andy Cosh (left) and Dr Giorgio Caselli (right). Photo courtesy of StillVision Photography.
This work has a number of important uses, including:
- provides the framework for infrastructure planning
- assists local government in their dealings with Whitehall
- analyses the development of business clusters over time
- measures the impact of local businesses on the national economy
- tracks the impact of the University on the local economy
- essential part of regional economic planning
The various elements of the project are described below.
Cambridge growth analysis
Since the project group’s formation, we have been concerned with establishing an authoritative analysis of the current scale, make-up and growth rate of economic activity in the Cambridge city region, defined by a 20-mile radius around Cambridge. We were commissioned by Cambridge Ahead to create a dashboard to monitor growth in Cambridge using the original Cluster Map created by Sherry Coutu and Trampoline Systems as a starting point. We began by updating and re-verifying the original Cluster Map data, adding data from sectors outside of high tech and extending the coverage to all companies, however small; and then putting in place curation to keep it up to date. For the first time, there is now a sound and robust measure of the Cambridge economy, and how it is growing, but it is also possible to wind the clock backwards to see how Cambridge has been growing in the past.
The Cambridge Cluster Insights platform (accessible via the tab above), known initially as Cambridge Cluster Map, was officially launched in July 2016 and is a dataset of information on 26,000 businesses in the Cambridge city region. Using the new methodology, it specifically monitors the growth of Cambridge-based companies, in terms of their global turnover and global employment, and tracks the number of Cambridge-active companies, and public and charitable sector research organisations.
Cambridge-based companies are those with their primary trading address within this area, or those that do not give a primary trading address but have a registered office in this area. Cambridge-active companies are those who have neither their registered office, nor primary trading address in the Cambridge area but do have a trading address in the area that we have identified, examples being Amazon, Apple and Microsoft. Non-corporate Knowledge-Intensive (KI) organisations are those research institutions that are located in the defined region which are neither companies, nor partnerships. Examples of these are the British Antarctic Survey, the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology and the Wellcome Sanger Institute.
Cambridge Cluster Insights has been refreshed approximately twice a year and will be updated with wholly new data annually. The last update was published in March 2024 and captures the impact of the ongoing conflict in Ukraine and the unfolding of the cost of living crisis (the median year end is early December 2022). A new and improved Cambridge Cluster Insights platform was launched in September 2019. This new platform, which covers 13 years of data for the Cambridge city region as well as each of the six local authority districts in the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority area, allows for a dynamic, interactive and timely analysis of the business population in the local region.
View Cambridge Cluster Insights via the tab above.
The work underpinning Cambridge Cluster Insights is disseminated locally, nationally and internationally. For example, we held briefing sessions attended by a large number of local stakeholders, where we discussed the economic geography of the Cambridge city region as well as an economic census of the wider Cambridgeshire and Peterborough region. Our approach and key findings were also presented at a series of workshops and seminars organised by a number of research institutions in China, including Liaoning University, Shenyang Institute of Technology, Shenyang University and Communication University of China.
Using unique growth measurement methodology, the project has so far produced 9 consecutive sets of growth data for the Cambridge city region; the first was released in February 2016 and the most recent in March 2024.
The last set of data shows that the corporate economy of the Cambridge City region has grown considerably over the years since 2010. Employment in KI sectors has increased at fast rates each year. The growth of businesses operating in non-KI sectors has been less strong in the second half of the period, but only when COVID struck did employment decline. Whilst the thirteen sectors examined all showed growth over the period, there is considerable variation across sectors. Turnover growth showed a similar picture, with a greater fall during the pandemic and an even stronger recovery as we came out of lockdowns than was the case for employment.
A substantial part of the decline in employment growth per annum over the past 6 years was associated with changes in the business stock in the region. An important cause of this was the decline in the contribution to annual employment growth of new business formation. Our initial analysis suggests that this may be a response to national rather than local factors.
The number of people employed in universities and non-corporate research institutions in the area (over 38,000 employees) has also continued to grow steadily, making the area one of the largest concentrations of KI employment in Europe.
Overall, these figures demonstrate not only the importance of Cambridge to its wider region, but also the value it offers on a national scale as a net contributor to the UK.
Read the full press release on the Cambridge Ahead website (March 2024).
The Business Board (formerly Greater Cambridge Greater Peterborough LEP)
The CBR was commissioned to create a company database for the 14 local authority districts making up the Greater Cambridge Greater Peterborough (GCGP) Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP, now The Business Board). This work has been completed and the database includes over 90,000 LEP-based companies and limited partnerships with their employment and turnover over the last 13 years. Of these, about 52,000 were alive at the end of the 2022/23 financial year and together represented employment of 494,000 and turnover of £98 billion. The analyses carried out examine the sectoral composition and growth of each of the local authority districts. Data for the 8 LEP districts outside the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority area are provided on Cambridge Cluster Insights only up to 2017/18.
Greater Cambridge employment updates
CBR research has been helping local councils and other authorities in the local region to provide support to businesses during the COVID-19 pandemic and the UK cost of living crisis. This research comprises a series of updates, commissioned by the Greater Cambridge Partnership and Cambridge Ahead, which bring up-to-date information about what is happening to corporate employment in the Greater Cambridge area that would not otherwise be available. It provides policymakers with robust and timely data on businesses and sectors in the area that can guide local recovery strategies and future investment plans.
Our latest update was completed in April 2024 and captures the impact of the onset of recession in the second half of 2023. We compared this period with the previous year, which covers the effects of the ongoing conflict in Ukraine on the recovery from COVID. The picture that emerges is one of continued but lower employment growth in Greater Cambridge in the year to mid-October 2023. Growth in the area slowed down from 7.7% in 2021/22 to 5.2% in 2022/23, suggesting that the onset of recession in the second half of 2023 has had some impact on business. Nevertheless, the employment performance of the Greater Cambridge corporate economy was far superior to the performance of the national economy over the same period. This robust employment growth was driven by a dynamic KI economy, with the ‘Knowledge intensive services’ and ‘High-tech manufacturing’ sectors reporting faster growth than one year earlier. Our results also point to continued recovery among non-KI sectors, which had been severely hit by lockdowns and other COVID-related restrictions. Overall, the results of our April 2024 Update portray a resilient corporate economy in Greater Cambridge against a backdrop of macroeconomic and geopolitical instability.
Economic forecasting
We are working with the local authorities to take their current economic model input data and add local understanding to it by using local business and sector-specific expectations rather than national ones. We are seeking to discover what businesses think future growth pressures will be, and what their growth might be if those pressures were better managed, in order to prioritise the infrastructure initiatives that will need to be taken. Creating such a bottom-up regional growth forecast has never been attempted before, and we have a great learning curve to get round to do it, but it should be very powerful when completed.
For example Cambridge has, with Marshall and its supply chains, a large aerospace component in its economy so the growth expectations of the aerospace sector will feature strongly in the local forecast. Where this breaks down though is that the national forecasts will be dominated by what Rolls Royce’s and BAE’s growth expectations are, which could be very different from Marshall’s.
A survey of the largest companies in the Cambridge area has been carried out. The survey focuses on 3 aspects: the connections between the Cambridge companies and the rest of the UK economy; local constraints on their growth; and their estimates of their sector’s growth over the next five years. It also asks their opinions about their impact on the economy, government policy and the impacts of Brexit on their growth. This survey allows for a bottom-up forecast of how much these companies think their sectors will grow over the next decade. In a nutshell, the survey results suggest that travel to work problems, along with the high cost and limited availability of housing, are affecting recruitment and retention of staff while impinging on productivity. These problems are also identified by companies as major factors limiting their growth in the Cambridge region. Despite these constraints, companies remain quite optimistic about their growth prospects, but are very concerned about Brexit.
A further supplementary technical task of comparing CBR data with employment growth rates from the Business Register and Employment Survey (BRES) and other employment-related sources maintained by the ONS is being undertaken. This analysis shows that the difference in employment growth rates between CBR and BRES data, albeit less extreme than it used to be, still remains.
Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Independent Economic Review
The Cambridgeshire and Peterborough economy is of national and international significance, comprising some of the fastest growing areas within the UK and internationally competitive industry, innovation and research. At the same time, it faces a number of challenges, constraints and imbalances that could hinder growth in the region if these are not properly addressed.
The purpose of the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Independent Economic Review (CPIER) is to create a single strategic position to help the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough area consider the case for greater fiscal devolution and powers to unlock the delivery of major infrastructure. The CPIER is led by the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Independent Economic Commission (CPIEC) and is co-funded by the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority, The Business Board and Cambridge Ahead.
Drawing on the corporate database as a unique source of information for businesses in the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough area, the CBR produced a number of analyses to support the work of the CPIEC. These include novel and in-depth studies of the corporate anatomy, foreign ownership and ownership changes, business demography and specialness of the corporate sectors in the Combined Authority and in each of its local authority districts.
After the ground-breaking CPIER work, the growth data produced by the CBR are being used to inform the Local Industrial Strategy. Support was also provided to the Digital Sector Strategy for Cambridgeshire and Peterborough, delivered by Cambridge Wireless and Anglia Ruskin University, through the provision of a range of quantitative data and analyses. The Digital Sector Strategy was published in May 2019 and is considered a valuable contribution to the Local Industrial Strategy.
The benefits and impact of the Babraham Research Campus
We have been working with Cambridge Economic Associates, Cambridge Econometrics and Savills on a project commissioned by Babraham Bioscience Technologies Ltd and its campus partners (BBSRC and the Babraham Institute) to identify, capture and demonstrate the benefits and impact of the Babraham Research Campus.
As part of this work, we designed and conducted a survey of Campus companies to quantify the impacts they make in local, national and international ecosystems. The survey, which achieved an extremely high response rate of 74%, also allowed to assess the scale and type of investment received by Campus companies over time. Responses from the survey were combined with unique information from the CBR corporate database to carry out detailed analyses of companies located on the Campus against those on other business and science parks in the Cambridge region.
The outputs from the impact assessment study are being used to inform the future development of the Babraham Research Campus and the overall contribution it provides to the Cambridge and UK economy. The final report, along with an Executive Summary highlighting the key findings from the impact assessment study, was published in June 2020.
Read the press release and access the final report on the Babraham Research Campus website.
Building on this work, the research team is now conducting an economic impact assessment of another major life sciences park in the Cambridge region, Granta Park. The focus of our work is the role played by Granta Park in the Cambridge life sciences ecosystem and its importance to the local and national economy.
Funding
Cambridge Ahead, Greater Cambridge Partnership, Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority, Arm, Marshall of Cambridge, Mills & Reeve, Babraham Research Campus, Granta Park, Barclays, The Business Board (formerly Greater Cambridge Greater Peterborough LEP) and Huntingdonshire District Council.
Articles
- Caselli, G., Cosh, A. and Tyler, P. (2021) “The Cambridge Phenomenon: an innovation system built on public-private partnership”, Innovation and Impact.
- Caselli, G., Figueira, C. and Nellis, J. G. (2020) “Ownership diversity and the risk-taking channel of monetary policy transmission”, Cambridge Journal of Economics.
- Cosh, A. and Caselli, G. (2019) “An insight into the Cambridge economy: What lies ahead for Silicon Fen?”, East Anglia in Business, No. 1, pp. 44-45.
- Walsh, L. (2019) “How to tend an economic bonfire”, Research Horizons, No. 38, pp. 6-9.
Working papers
- Cosh, A. and Caselli, G. (2022) 2020 BRES results for Greater Cambridge.
- Cosh, A. and Caselli, G. (2022) 2020 BRES results for the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority area.
- Caselli, G., Cosh, A. and Tyler, P. (2022) The Cambridge Phenomenon Innovation System at 60.
- Caselli, G. (2022) Natural disasters and credit standards.
- Caselli, G. (2022) Temperature shocks, credit risk and loan pricing.
- Cosh, A. and Caselli, G. (2021), 2019 BRES results for the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority.
- Cosh, A. and Caselli, G. (2021), Annual draw 2020 highlights.
- Cosh, A. and Caselli, G. (2021), Research brief on market towns.
- Caselli, G. (2021), Temperature shocks, credit risk and loan pricing.
- Cosh, A. and Caselli, G. (2019), Comparison of employment, GVA and labour productivity estimates.
- Cosh, A. and Caselli, G. (2019), 2018 BRES results: A preliminary analysis for the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority area.
- Cosh, A. and Caselli, G. (2018), Comparison of the employment growth from the corporate database with BRES data.
- Cosh, A. and Caselli, G. (2018), Contribution of the Combined Authority to the wider UK economy.
- Cosh, A. and Caselli, G. (2018), Corporate anatomy of the Combined Authority.
- Cosh, A. and Caselli, G. (2018), Foreign ownership and ownership changes in the Combined Authority.
- Cosh, A. and Caselli, G. (2018), Research brief on market towns.
Other publications
- Cosh, A. and Caselli, G. (2022) Greater Cambridge Employment Update June 2022, report to the Greater Cambridge Partnership and Cambridge Ahead, June 2022.
- Cosh, A. and Caselli, G. (2022) Greater Cambridge Employment Update February 2022, report to the Greater Cambridge Partnership and Cambridge Ahead, February 2022.
- Cosh, A. and Caselli, G. (2021) Greater Cambridge Employment Update October 2021, report to the Greater Cambridge Partnership and Cambridge Ahead, October 2021.
- Cambridge Ahead (2021) Annual Publication 2021, November 2021.
- ScaleUp Institute (2021) ScaleUp Annual Review 2021, November 2021.
- Cambridge Ahead (2021) A new era for the Cambridge economy: Spring 2021 Members’ Meeting, May 2021.
- Caselli, G. (2021) “How do cooperative banks consider climate risk and climate change?”, in: Migliorelli, M. and Lamarque, E. (Eds) Contemporary trends in European cooperative banking: Sustainability, governance, digital transformation, and health crisis response, Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, forthcoming.
- Cosh, A. and Caselli, G. (2021) Greater Cambridge Employment Update February 2021, report to the Greater Cambridge Partnership and Cambridge Ahead.
- Cosh, A. and Caselli, G. (2021) Greater Cambridge Employment Update June 2021, report to the Greater Cambridge Partnership and Cambridge Ahead.
- OECD (2021) Local entrepreneurship ecosystems and emerging industries: Case study of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough, United Kingdom, February 2021.
- Caselli, G. (2020) “The role of bank ownership types and business models”, in: Ferri, G. and D’Apice, V. (Eds) A modern guide to financial shocks and crises, Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar Publishing, forthcoming, ISBN: 978-1-78990-451-2.
- Caselli, G. and Figueira, C. (2020) “The impact of climate risks on the insurance and banking industries”, in: Migliorelli, M. and Dessertine, P. (Eds) Sustainability and financial risks: The impact of climate change, environmental degradation and social inequality on financial markets, Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 31-62, ISBN: 978-3-030-54529-1.
- Cosh, A. and Caselli, G. (2020) Greater Cambridge Employment Update November 2020, report to the Greater Cambridge Partnership and Cambridge Ahead.
- Cosh, A. and Caselli, G. (2020) SME Observatory Insight into scale-up and high-growth businesses, report to the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority.
- ScaleUp Institute (2020) ScaleUp Annual Review 2020, November 2020.
- Cambridge Ahead (2018) Cambridge Ahead Annual Publication 2018/19.
- Cambridge Ahead (2019) Cambridge Ahead Summer Publication 2019.
- Cambridge Wireless and Anglia Ruskin University (2019), A Digital Sector Strategy for Cambridgeshire & Peterborough.
- Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Independent Economic Commission (2018), Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Independent Economic Review (CPIER) Final Report.
- ScaleUp Institute (2018) Annual ScaleUp Review 2018.
GCP Employment Updates
2024 release (2022-23 draw)
Guidance on CBR data and analyses
2023 release (2021-22 draw)
2022 release (2020-21 draw)
2021 release (2019-20 draw)
2020 release (2018-19 draw)
2019 release (2017-18 draw)
2018 release (2016-17 draw)
2017 release (2015-16 draw)
2016 release (2014-15 draw)
Videos
The Camclustermap with Dr Andy Cosh of the Centre for Business Research (Cambridge TV Business Focus)
One of an ongoing series of Business Focus interviews on Cambridge TV, this is the 12-minute interview of Dr Andy Cosh of the Centre for Business Research (CBR) of the University of Cambridge. The topic is the new version of the Cambridge Cluster Map, created by Cambridge Ahead in partnership with Barclays using data from the CBR. Dr Cosh is asked about the CBR and what it does, what the Cluster Map is and does, how it works, what it reveals about the Cambridge region, growth, the impact of Brexit, and how it is of interest to academic researchers. The interview was first aired on Monday 16 August 2016.
New Cambridge Growth data by Cambridge Ahead (Cambridge TV report)
A package by Cambridge TV on the announcement by Cambridge Ahead of remarkable new Growth data for Cambridge companies. Presenter is Karen Thomas while reporter Holly Goodall visits Cambridge Consultants and interviews COO Eric Wilkinson, before visiting Matthew Bullock, Master of St Edmund’s College and leader of the CA Growth Project where the new Cambridge Cluster Map is also revealed.
Media coverage
Cambridge Independent: “Cambridge economy growing through crosswinds and challenges.”
22 July 2024
Cambridge Independent: “Jobs growth in Cambridge region continues with more sectors recovering”
2 April 2024
Cambridge Network: “Latest research shows sustained employment growth across the region’s diverse economy”
25 March 2024
Business Weekly: “Life sciences and hi-tech lead jobs growth in Cambridge”
25 March 2024
Cambridge Network: “Latest Greater Cambridge employment data showcases impressive economic strength and stability”
Also published in Cambridge Ahead and on the Greater Cambridge Partnership website
20 November 2023
Cambridge Ahead: “Cambridge city region: creating a model for innovation and sustainable economic growth”
28 July 2023
University of Cambridge: “Quantifying the Cambridge Cluster”
2 May 2023
Cambridge Independent: “Life sciences and IT drove Cambridge growth in pandemic’s first year”
16 March 2022
Cambridge Independent: “Employment growth remains strong in Greater Cambridge region’s knowledge-intensive businesses but falls elsewhere”
28 December 2021
Cambridge Network: “Knowledge intensive sectors ensure Greater Cambridge employment rates grow despite COVID challenges”
20 December 2021
Business Weekly: “Cambridge at crossroads despite major KI status in Europe”
3 March 2021
Business Weekly: “Babraham confirmed as global life science power player”
16 June 2020
Cambridge Independent: “Four ways Cambridge could grow – but they all mean compromise”
8 July 2018
Cambridge 105 Radio: “Cambridge businesses continue to grow”
30 May 2018
Cambridge News: “Closing the gap between rich and poor key to region’s future”
9 May 2018
Cambridge News: “Big names form commission to study Cambridgeshire economy”
8 January 2018
Cambridge Network: “New data reveals remarkable growth of Cambridge companies”
26 February 2016
Cambridge Cluster Insights is an interactive dashboard with information on 26,000 businesses in the wider Cambridge region. It monitors global turnover and employment growth of Cambridge-based companies and tracks the number of Cambridge-active companies as well as non-corporate knowledge-intensive (KI) research organisations. Use the filters provided to create bespoke analyses for the area, organisation type and sector you are interested in. By default the dashboard shows only those organisations that were alive at the end of the latest time period. Further guidance on the data presented on Cambridge Cluster Insights can be accessed by clicking on the information icons that appear on the dashboard.
Learn more about the Cambridge Corporate Database & Regional Growth project