The UK Government's newly published Modern Industrial Strategy is a significant recognition of the central role of data in the country's economic future. Data is explicitly treated as a strategic national asset, essential to the UK's "long-term national renewal," backed by over £100 million for a National Data Library and ambitious commitments to expand Smart Data schemes across multiple sectors.
This represents a fundamental shift from viewing data as a byproduct of digital services to recognising its central role in economic competitiveness, requiring strategic investment and governance. The government estimates that better use of private and public data could boost productivity growth by 0.5 - 1.3% annually, transformational gains for a country grappling with persistent productivity challenges.
Yet for all its ambition, the strategy raises important questions about scale, coordination, and implementation that will determine whether these commitments translate into meaningful economic impact.
The IS-8 sectors and strategic investment
The strategy focuses government support on eight high-growth sectors (the "IS-8") representing 32% of the UK economy. From advanced manufacturing and clean energy industries to creative industries and financial services, each sector receives data commitments that signal a genuine understanding of data's economic potential.
The numbers are substantial. The Life Sciences sector receives a £600 million Health Data Research Service to create "the world's most advanced, secure, and AI-ready health data platform." Creative Industries receive a Creative Content Exchange to commercialise digitised cultural assets. An Industrial Strategy AI Adoption Fund will develop cutting-edge AI solutions across all IS-8 sectors, while Smart Data schemes expand beyond the successful Open Banking model that has already enabled 82 firms to raise over £2 billion and create 4,800 jobs.
Workers in these IS-8 sectors earn on average £7,900 more per year than in other industries and are 27.1% more productive than the UK national average. The strategy positions high-quality data access and sharing as essential for the competitiveness and innovation capacity of all eight sectors.
Investment scale and coordination challenges
The Infrastructure Strategy, published alongside the Industrial Strategy, commits £2 billion to building sovereign compute capacity to support growth, including expanding compute resources available to academics and researchers. This is accompanied by the creation of AI Growth Zones, which offer enhanced access to power and support for planning approvals, enabling investment in AI-enabled data centres and supporting infrastructure.
Alongside this, £12 million from 2026 will fund data-sharing infrastructure initiatives inspired by European data spaces, focusing on interoperability, legal frameworks, security, and trust.
While these investments are welcome, the disparity in scale raises questions about ambition. The £12 million for data-sharing infrastructure, though explicitly focused on coordination and standards, represents a markedly different level of commitment compared to the billions flowing to computing and physical infrastructure.
Smart Data expansion receives £36 million to build on the track record of Open Banking, by expanding schemes in new sectors. The strategy's success will be enhanced by ensuring coordination mechanisms emerge to enable interoperability between sectors and maximise the network effects that make data sharing most valuable.
Alignment with ODI's recommendations
Comparing the strategy with ODI's consultation response back in January reveals both encouraging alignment and notable gaps. The government's commitment to treating data as an economic asset and ensuring the National Data Library is AI-ready from the outset directly reflects priorities we've championed. The investment in data-sharing infrastructure, explicitly learning from EU Common European Data Spaces, shows welcome attention to international best practices.
However, several of our recommendations received only partial reflection. While the strategy embraces interoperability, it doesn't reference specific technical standards like the FAIR principles or Croissant that would make datasets truly AI-ready. Privacy-enhancing technologies receive no mention, despite trust being acknowledged as essential for the success of data sharing. Technologies like Solid, which enable user-centric data control and privacy-preserving approaches, could play a crucial role in building the public confidence necessary for the widespread adoption of data sharing.
The 2026 watershed
The strategy establishes April 2026 as a critical milestone. A data valuation framework will treat government data as balance sheet assets, a potentially transformational shift in how public sector data is managed and monetised. The same timeline sees up to £12 million committed to data-sharing infrastructure initiatives and £36 million supporting new Smart Data schemes.
These represent genuine opportunities for organisations with proven data expertise. ODI's track record spans the critical capabilities this agenda demands. We are members of the Smart Data Council and delivery partners in the Smart Data Challenge Prize. Our stewardship of Solid offers privacy-enhancing technology solutions, and OpenActive demonstrates practical success in data standards that deliver societal value, making 3m opportunities to get active available as open data every month, while saving healthcare workers up to 50% of referral time.
Implementation will define success
The strategy's success will hinge on several critical implementation factors. The National Data Library's ambition to provide trusted data foundations for the IS-8 sectors will require robust metadata standards and discoverability frameworks that make datasets genuinely useful for AI and innovation applications.
The data valuation framework represents relatively new territory that requires careful development to strike a balance between the public good and economic value creation.
The expansion of Smart Data schemes into energy, transport, and digital markets will benefit from cross-sector coordination and consistent technical standards to ensure interoperability and maximise network effects across different industries.
A platform for the next phase
The Modern Industrial Strategy represents a comprehensive recognition of data's centrality in driving growth. The financial commitments are substantial, and the sectoral coverage is broad, creating a platform for significant progress in building a data economy that works for everyone.
The key questions now are whether the implementation will match the ambition, whether coordination mechanisms will emerge to prevent fragmentation, and whether the technical standards and governance frameworks will be robust enough to deliver the productivity gains the strategy promises.
