New SPI Study Identifies Key Skills Challenges and Opportunities for the UK’s Rapidly Evolving Digital Content Production Sectors
Image credit: Hans Eiskonen
Today, the BFI has published Olsberg•SPI (SPI)’s in-depth report, Skills Scoping Study for the UK’s Digital Content Production Sectors, which identifies the key current skills gaps and shortages – as well as related opportunities for job creation– within the UK’s animation, post-production, VFX, video games and emerging tech sectors (digital content production sectors).
Specifically, the study looks at:
The current picture – Providing an overview of the wider technological and policy factors affecting these sectors, the current key skills and roles required, and the existing skills gaps and shortages
The future picture – Highlighting the required short-term (less than three years), medium-term (three to five years’ time) and long-term (over five years’ time) skills, and how suitable existing training provision is to meet these needs
Future research needs – Providing recommendations for potential future research and avenues of inquiry.
The study’s conclusions acknowledge the significant economic value generated by the UK’s digital content production sectors and confirm that they are at the forefront of innovation, with strong potential for further growth driven by global demand for digital content, as well as public and private investment.
However, the UK’s digital content production sectors are also experiencing significant skills shortages and gaps, limiting their full growth potential. Further, the sectors are experiencing an unprecedented period of increased and complex uncertainty, which is impacting skills development. Factors include rapid technological advances requiring new skill sets, fluctuating commissioning production spend, increased international competition offering sizeable tax reliefs and beneficial working conditions, and difficulties establishing effective and sustainable training budgets alongside other development and production costs.
SPI’s study follows the BFI Skills Review 2022, which was commissioned by the DCMS and chiefly focused on the UK’s scripted film and HETV production sectors, assessing the key skills challenges they face, as well as existing initiatives to solve them. The BFI Skills Review 2022 resulted in the Screen Sectors’ Skills Task Force, which recently published its own recommendations to transform the industry’s approach to skills development.
Download the Skills Scoping Study for the UK’s Digital Content Production Sectors report here.
Read the full press release, including key conclusions, here.
For further questions on the study, please contact:
Joshua Dedman, SPI Consultant / joshua@o-spi.com
Tina McFarling, BFI Head of Strategic Communications / tina.mcfarling@bfi.org.uk
Colette Geraghty, BFI Senior PR Manager, Corporate, Industry and Partnerships / colette.geraghty@bfi.org.uk
Further information on SPI’s sector research and analysis can be found here.