Behind it all – are businesses dedicated to investing in research and development projects?

Many technical terms – and there seem to be new words competing for Oxford English Dictionary entries almost daily, can be a challenge to interpret, at least for those of us less tech savvy not working in the industry directly.  

However, behind the changing landscape of our language are innovations in technology, across a wide variety of business sectors that are contributing significantly to rapid changes and improvements in the way we experience and manage our daily lives.

That statement may not be big news. Many may read it and think: “Yes, thanks for telling me something I already knew”, but how often do we truly understand how the technology that is increasingly entering so many areas of life is developed, for what precise applications and how UK businesses are able to fund the research and development that must inevitably, initially, go in to creating new tech.

The financial support businesses need is being made available to them

To deal with the last of those questions first: the government is actively encouraging business to invest in Research & Development projects, not least because the UK has historically been recognised for innovative thinking and being a hotbed of new ideas: a reputation that stands us in good stead internationally in the world of business. Thus, as well as making grants available, the treasury is constantly reviewing tax incentives to encourage competitiveness in Research and Development among UK companies.

Certain sectors are investing heavily in technological Research and Development, giving rise not only to new ways of doing things but also to the new terminology that, as suggested, may not be as readily recognised or understood as the end results it refers to. FinTech, RegTech, InsurTech and SportsTech.

We’ll have a series of blogs where we’ll focus on one of these new terms and identify where research and development projects have played a part in forging our brave and bold new world.

In the meantime, we have our own terminology that might flummox you a little bit, our favourites are “Research and Development Tax Relief” and “R&D Tax Credits”, which often have left even the most tech savvy of entrepreneurs struggling to keep up.

If you have a Tech project that you are working on right now, or you’ve been working on it in the last couple of years and you are interested in finding out more about R&D Tax Credits, then get in touch with the experts at Cooden Tax Consulting.

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