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Nicholas Lovell
Home   >   Self-Publishing   >   Finance   >   How much does the UK government spend on games?

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How much does the UK government spend on games?

By on September 21, 2009

The UK government has just released figures showing that the nine Regional Development Agencies have invested nearly £2 million pounds in the development of the games industry in England (and I mean England, the figures don’t cover Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland).

RDA funding to the computer games industry

2007-2008
Advantage West Midlands

£800,000

*
East of England Development Agency

£62,000

East Midlands Development Agency

£164,000

London Development Agency

£121,000

North West Development Agency

£166,000
One North East

£471,000

South East of England Development Agency

–

 **
South West of England RDA

–

 **
Yorkshire Forward

£99,000

£1,883,000

* AWM has provided £800,000 of support to develop the Serious Games sector
** SEEDA and SWERDA don’t have specific game programmes, so could not provide data

I’m intrigued to know where this £2 million is going, and whether it has been effective. If you’ve received some of the money, do let me know.

But more broadly, is £2 million enough? Do you think that the government should be investing directly into risky games companies at all – perhaps that should be left to the capitalist economy?

Please, tell me your thoughts in the comments. I’d really like to hear from you.

About Nicholas Lovell

Nicholas is the founder of Gamesbrief, a blog dedicated to the business of games. It aims to be informative, authoritative and above all helpful to developers grappling with business strategy. He is the author of a growing list of books about making money in the games industry and other digital media, including How to Publish a Game and Design Rules for Free-to-Play Games, and Penguin-published title The Curve: thecurveonline.com