Sheffield City Region Digital Action Plan
Client: Sheffield City Region Local Enterprise Partnership
There is a growing understanding that technology underpins the economy and is vital to businesses across all sectors. As a result, growing the digital sector is a key priority for the Sheffield City Region Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP). In 2017, the LEP commissioned SQW to: "build a greater understanding of the digital sector in the Sheffield City Region and to create a Digital Action Plan, designed to enable the area to meet the related challenges of growing the sector and competing globally".
SQW carried out a detailed analysis of the emerging digital cluster in the City Region. This work informed the Digital Action Plan which contained a comprehensive evidence base both for the City Region's digital sector and for the supply and demand of digital skills in the wider economy. It included evidence from a wide range of data and reports, as well as from consultations with around 50 businesses and other stakeholders in the City Region. Based on an independent analysis of the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats facing the City Region's digital economy, it identified the key actions that the LEP – and its partners in business, government and the private sector – will take to drive forward Sheffield City Region's digital potential.
