Global demand for UK tech continues to rise despite economic woes

The UK in red and the EU in blue as seen in a digitised map
(Image credit: Shutterstock)

The UK's computer exports in 2018 were worth 3.2 billion, as the country's tech sector continues to have a large impact on the overall economy.

This is according to a report from the Department for International Trade (DIT), which said that the UK exported 282.9 million worth of spacecraft and 62.4 million worth of robots in 2018. That was a 201.8% increase since 2013.

London and the South East continue to dominate the UK's digital industry, with companies across these regions seeing an increased global appetite fortheir products.

Latest HMRC regional statistics show that all goods exports from the South East increased by 4.84% from 45.4 billion for the year ending March 2018 to 47.7 billion for the year ending March 2019. Similarly, goods exports from London increased by 6.7% from 36.3 billion to 38.9 billion within the same timeframe.

"Despite a world economic slowdown, the Department for International Trade is helping British businesses succeed abroad in ways that never happened before," said International Trade Secretary Dr Liam Fox MP. "And as the digital sector continues to grow year on year, this can be credited to pioneering UK companies that are consistently developing new cutting-edge technology, which is enhancing the way we work, learn and play.

"I would encourage any UK tech business that wants to explore new international markets and see what opportunities await on a global stage, to contact DIT who can help navigate the entire exporting process."

For example, one export champion cited by the DIT that is Guildford-based Gold-i, the first FinTech company to win a Queen's Award for Enterprise in Innovation. The business currently exports to 33 countries including Australia, China and Malaysia with Australia being its biggest market. Gold-i's current turnover is 3 million with international exports accounting for 68% of overall sales, estimated to increase to 80% by 2022.

Bobby Hellard

Bobby Hellard is ITPro's Reviews Editor and has worked on CloudPro and ChannelPro since 2018. In his time at ITPro, Bobby has covered stories for all the major technology companies, such as Apple, Microsoft, Amazon and Facebook, and regularly attends industry-leading events such as AWS Re:Invent and Google Cloud Next.

Bobby mainly covers hardware reviews, but you will also recognize him as the face of many of our video reviews of laptops and smartphones.