Global Talent visa expanded to attract world's brightest researchers to power British innovation

More than 100 innovative research companies can now support the world's brightest researchers to come and work in the UK through the Global Talent visa.

Global Talent visa scheme extended to more than one hundred companies

Global names like AstraZeneca and JLR, as well as fast-growing innovators, will benefit from a bigger pool of leading scientists and engineers. 

Move cements Britain as top destination for the world’s best talent, enabling innovative businesses to scale and stay in the UK, and laying the foundations for skilled jobs and economic growth in every postcode. 

An expansion of the Global Talent visa announced today (Thursday 6 August) will give more than 100 of the UK’s most innovative companies the ability to support some of the world’s best scientists and engineers to come to live and work in the UK, unlocking a wave of international talent. 

The move will help secure the arrival of some of the world’s best and brightest to drive breakthroughs in clean energy, life sciences and AI, while helping key businesses to innovate, scale and stay in the UK, in one more step towards reindustrialising Britain.  

For the first time, exceptional researchers coming to the UK to work on funded projects can be supported in their move by UK research intensive businesses thanks to the country’s premier visa route for research talent. 

This move isn’t just about attracting the best researchers from around the world. Bringing in top talent from abroad will enable businesses to undertake cutting-edge R&D projects here in the UK – projects which support jobs for British workers.

Having already helped over 12,500 talented people from more than 130 countries build their research careers in Britain via the endorsed funder pathway, this expansion of the Global Talent visa route means some of the UK’s most innovative companies can now host top researchers alongside higher education, academic and independent research institutes and bodies.