Aberdeen appears to be the Scottish city with the best chance of producing the country’s next great inventor.
A new study has found that Europe’s energy capital is a hot spot for inventions with the most patents applications per employee in the UK.
Workers in the north-east of Scotland filed 389 such patents in the last three years, with the majority of those coming from Aberdeen.
In second place was London, where 291 applications were received, according to the first-ever nationwide UK Local Innovation Index, compiled by the Centre for Economics & Business Research (CEBR).
It may come as no surprise that the Granite City’s prowess is tied to the oil and gas industry.
The study found that the key innovation developments have been in energy, including oil extraction technology and advancement in renewables, such as offshore wind and hydrogen.
The Scottish authorities seem determined to capitalise on the ingenuity of Aberdeen’s workforce.
Earlier this month Energy Minister Fergus Ewing unveiled the city’s Oil and Gas Innovation Centre (Ogic), which works with universities and more than 2,000 energy enterprises to accelerate the new technologies needed to bring down operating costs, improve productivity and address innovation requirements in decommissioning.
The Scottish Funding Council earlier this year approved start-up funding worth £10.6million for Ogic.