1. Introduction
This User Guide accompanies the Bioscience and Health Technology Sector Statistics 2020 release. It is intended to be useful reference guide, defining key terms used in the publication, and explaining issues involved in producing the report.
We welcome feedback on the Bioscience and Health Technology Sector Statistics publications, its accompanying datasets and this User Guide. In addition, we continuously aim to improve the accessibility of our documents. If you experience any problems reading the report or using data, or have any feedback relating to accessibility or otherwise, please contact by email at [email protected], including “BAHTSS publication feedback” in the subject line.
2. Data partners acknowledgement statement
The Office for Life Sciences gratefully acknowledge the contribution of the following regional and national organisations in the compilation of the Bioscience and Health Technology Sector Statistics database over the past eleven years.
The content of the database has been derived from a variety of proprietary data sources which have been provided under licence. The Office for Life Sciences would like to acknowledge the assistance given by the owners of these data sources.
Business Information was accessed under licence by Dun & Bradstreet (D&B) Limited and the FAME database from Bureau van Dijk Electronic Publishing. More details on how this data is used can be found in the Methodology.
The database construction, data integration, data analysis and commentary preparation were completed by a consortium led by Kepier & Company Ltd. The consortium included Cels Business Services (CBSL) Ltd and Lindum Research.
2.1 Data partners
- Association of British Healthcare Industries (ABHI)
- Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry (ABPI)
- AXREM
- BioIndustry Association (BIA)
- BioNow
- Bioindustry
- Biopartner
- Biosciences Knowledge Transfer Network (KTN)
- British Healthcare Trade Association (BHTA)
- British In Vitro Diagnostics Association (BIVDA)
- HealthTech and Medicines Knowledge Transfer Network (KTN)
- Innovate UK
- Invest Northern Ireland
- MedCity
- Medicines Discovery Catapult
- Medilink East Midlands
- Medilink North of England
- Medilink South West
- Medilink West Midlands
- MediWales
- MHRA
- OBN
- One Nucleus
- Scottish Enterprise
- South East Health Technologies Alliance (SEHTA)
- TechUK
- Welsh Government
- West of England LEP
3. Data quality principles
These statistics are released as an Official Statistics publication, and we aim to collect data and produce this report in line with principles of the Code of Practice for Statistics[footnote 1]. This allows us to engender trust in our data and encourage the use of this report as a reliable source of information on the UK life sciences sector.
The following data quality statement covers the fourteen principles under the three pillars of the Code: trustworthiness, quality and value.
3.1 Trustworthiness
T1: Honesty and integrity – Data is collected, processed and quality assured by an independent contractor. The initial technical specification is set by professional analysts within the Office for Life Sciences (OLS) who also engage regularly with the contractor, review methodological aspects, and undertake further quality assurance checks before publication.
T2: Independent decision making …….