Connecting the North: A spotlight on South Yorkshire’s Tech Landscape

Connecting the North: A spotlight on South Yorkshire's tech landscape

Key findings

• Startups in the North of England have produced £7.50 of enterprise value for every £1 of VC invested since 2010, against £6.40 for the UK as a whole.
• South Yorkshire startups reached a combined value of £3.0B in 2024, eight times the £370M they were worth in 2014.
• Physical tech took 72% of the VC invested in South Yorkshire between 2020 and 2024, against 31% across the UK, so the region's funding mix leans to hardware.
• South Yorkshire startups raised £219M of VC between 2020 and 2024, third-lowest of the 15 peer European ecosystems shown and far behind Manchester's £2.0B.
• South Yorkshire counts 110 early-stage and 12 breakout-stage VC-backed startups, and two companies that reached US$1B, so the pipeline thins at scale-up.