Budget: Reading-based tech company wants more done on IT skills

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TBM Team

Fairsail, the Reading technology company and the UK's fastest-growing tech scale-up, says the Budget did not adequately address the acute need for more skilled IT professionals.

Adam Hale, CEO of Fairsail, which has just been acquired by Sage, the UK’s largest software company, says he gets extremely frustrated about the lack of focus on tackling the country’s severe IT skills shortage - especially in IT.

“£500 million to spend on skills is a nice headline-grabbing figure, but it’s not nearly enough. Neither is it focussed on where we need to radically improve skills – in IT. We would really like to see more focus on the T in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Maths) – we think it’s T-time!

"We have a chronic IT talent shortage in the UK which we would like the government to address specifically – it’s a huge opportunity for the country.

"As the UK’s fastest growing technology scale-up, we have an acute need for technology professionals, yet it’s unbelievably difficult to find them. And with only 5,600 students studying Computer Science at A-Level in 2016 (600 of which were female!) vs 31,000 doing Sociology, it’s no surprise. We could be aiming for at least a 10-fold increase here over the next five years, with females making up at least 30%.

"In a world where every industry is rapidly digitising, we strongly encourage the Government to make this a priority or scale ups like us will have to move technology off shore."

TBM Team