An immigration system can serve more than one purpose. It can regulate migration while also helping determine whether businesses can access the talent they need to support investment, research and growth.

For much of the past three years, UK immigration policy has focused heavily on reducing migration. Successive reforms have tightened eligibility across the legal migration system, and recent statistics suggest those policies have achieved their immediate objective.

Increasingly, however, a different question is emerging: what economic purpose should individual immigration routes serve?

The further widening of access to the Global Talent visa illustrates that evolution. It also has particular relevance for pharmaceutical, biotech and other research-intensive businesses competing internationally for the people needed to research, develop and commercialise new technologies.

Global Talent is designed for people working in fields including science, engineering and medicine who meet its rigorous eligibility requirements. Unlike conventional employer-sponsored immigration, it centres on the individual rather than sponsorship by a particular employer. Most applicants must first secure endorsement from an approved endorsing body before applying for immigration permission.

Certain holders of qualifying prestigious prizes can apply without endorsement.
For academics and researchers, fast-track endorsement pathways cover eligible academic or research appointments, qualifying individual fellowships and the UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) Endorsed Funder pathway, alongside a separate peer-review route.

Once granted, Global Talent provides significant flexibility. Applicants can receive permission for up to five years at a time and can work or be self-employed, subject to limited exceptions. Researchers endorsed by UKRI can qualify for settlement after a three-year qualifying period, with time spent in certain other eligible immigration categories counting towards that period, subject to the relevant requirements. Dependants can also accompany the main applicant.

For businesses competing internationally for researchers, that flexibility can form part of the UK’s recruitment proposition.

The UKRI Endorsed Funder pathway, at the centre of the recent expansion, connects three elements:

1. An eligible researcher

2. A UKRI-approved employing or hosting organisation

3. Qualifying research supported by a UKRI-endorsed funder.

The researcher must be employed or hosted by an organisation on UKRI’s approved list and make a critical contribution to work supported by a substantial research grant or award from an endorsed funder. The organisation employs or hosts the researcher, while the endorsed funder provides the qualifying research funding.
The applicant must contribute either by directing, independently or under the supervision of a Principal Investigator, a qualifying research or innovation project, providing core technical or domain expertise or developing new technologies or methodologies. Further requirements apply to the applicant’s qualifications or equivalent research experience, employment or hosting arrangement, time spent on the funded research, and the value and duration of the grant or award.

Importantly for research-intensive businesses, the pathway can cover any research field or discipline within the endorsed funder’s scope and remit.

The recent change does not redesign Global Talent or alter the underlying applicant requirements. Instead, it expands the UKRI-approved list of organisations that can employ or host eligible researchers under the existing pathway.

More than 100 commercial research-intensive businesses are now on that approved list alongside universities and research institutes. The latest expansion builds on an earlier widening of the list and includes businesses operating across high-growth sectors identified in the Industrial Strategy.

The significance therefore lies not in changing who qualifies, but in recognising a broader range of environments where qualifying research takes place.

That is particularly relevant to life sciences. The disciplines covered by the wider Global Talent research framework include pharmaceuticals, drug delivery, biomedical and medical engineering, medical devices, biochemistry, molecular biology, immunology, pharmacology, molecular medicine and numerous areas of clinical research.

Commercial R&D businesses play an important role in developing, testing and commercialising research across this landscape. Widening access while maintaining the pathway’s existing standards gives more qualifying businesses an additional tool to compete for internationally mobile research expertise.

The policy also matters beyond individual recruitment.

The government links the expansion to commercial R&D, productivity, investment, business scale-up, spinouts and the priority sectors identified in the Industrial Strategy. Life sciences is expressly among the high-growth sectors covered by the expansion.

Nor is the expansion an isolated measure. Earlier this year, the government widened fast-track endorsement for academic and research appointments, alongside initiatives to identify and attract internationally mobile research and innovation talent.
Together, these measures point to a more active approach to competing for the people needed to support the UK’s industrial and growth ambitions.

Taken together, these developments support one interpretation: immigration policy is increasingly being deployed not only to address labour-market needs, but also as an instrument of innovation and economic policy.

For pharmaceutical and biotech businesses in the UK, the question is broader than whether an individual vacancy can be filled. It is what research and technical capabilities will be required to deliver future R&D, commercialisation and growth – and how the immigration system can support access to them.

Businesses already on UKRI’s list of approved employing or hosting organisations should consider whether the Endorsed Funder pathway is relevant to existing or planned research recruitment. That requires looking beyond the job title to the individual, qualifying funded research and the relationship between the role and the relevant grant or award.

The exercise should start with the business need, not the visa.

The Global Talent visa route may be an attractive answer for some researchers, but it will not fit every hire. It remains a selective route with specific eligibility and evidential requirements, including distinct requirements under different endorsement pathways. Home Office guidance also recognises that the endorsement framework does not necessarily cover every speciality and directs individuals who cannot qualify towards alternative immigration routes.

For employers, the implication is a portfolio approach. Global Talent can sit alongside sponsored and other work routes as part of a wider international talent strategy. The appropriate tool will depend on the individual, role and circumstances.

That matters beyond recruitment. Decisions about where to build research teams, undertake R&D and support future growth can depend in part on access to the necessary expertise. Integrating immigration planning with workforce, R&D and investment strategy can help businesses identify potential talent constraints before recruitment begins.

The expansion may also matter to research-intensive businesses not currently on UKRI’s approved list.

UKRI has invited additional research-intensive organisations to register their interest in becoming approved employing or hosting organisations under the Endorsed Funder pathway. Greater clarity around the approval criteria, evidence requirements and assessment process would help eligible businesses determine whether participation is relevant to them.

The practical questions therefore differ depending on where a business sits today. Organisations already on UKRI’s approved list should consider how effectively they are using the pathway; those not currently approved should consider whether their research activity and future talent needs make seeking approval worth exploring.

The significance of the expansion extends beyond the additional businesses now able to participate. It provides further evidence of a more targeted approach to economic migration, with different immigration routes increasingly aligned with different economic objectives – from workforce development to research excellence, innovation and long-term competitiveness.

For pharmaceutical, biotech and other research-intensive businesses, the opportunity is to apply the same thinking. Immigration strategy should form part of wider decisions about workforce capability, R&D and investment: what talent will be needed, where that expertise can be found and which immigration tools provide access.

Access to international research talent is only one factor in the UK’s competitiveness as a life sciences destination, but it is an important one. As the government aligns immigration policy more closely with its industrial and innovation ambitions, businesses should be equally deliberate in connecting international talent with their plans for research, investment and growth.

Shuyeb Muquit is the UK Government Affairs Strategy Director at global immigration advisers Fragomen, www.fragomen.com