British chipmakers are sounding the alarm over the UK’s strict immigration policies, which they claim are hampering their ability to recruit foreign talent needed to compete globally, according to Bloomberg.
With both the Conservative and Labor parties pledging to reduce net migration at the next general election, industry leaders fear existing barriers to hiring skilled international workers will persist regardless of the election results.
“Talent is the bottleneck of everything we do,” said Rodney Belzel, chief technology officer of IQE, a chipmaker that counts Apple among its customers.
In an interview with Bloomberg, Belzil expressed his concern that finding skilled workers will become a major problem in the near future.
Real effects
The UK government’s current strategy classifies semiconductors as a technology critical to the economy, focusing on their role in manufacturing devices ranging from smartphones to cars to rockets, according to Bloomberg.
The United Kingdom is allocating one billion pounds sterling to boost this industry, compared to tens of billions of dollars in subsidies provided by the United States and the European Union.
vacancies
The agency said nearly 80% of chip companies in the UK have vacancies, with many positions difficult to fill due to skills shortages.
The procedures for hiring international workers – according to Bloomberg – are seen as very bureaucratic and expensive, as it takes up to 18 weeks to obtain a visa compared to 6 weeks in France.
“We’ve had a real struggle in deep tech, a real struggle in recruiting people in England,” said Colin Humphreys, co-founder of Paragraph, a company developing chip technologies using graphene. “We want a government that really drives investment in science, technology and industry.”
He added that Paragraph is considering moving its operations to the United States because of the ease of doing business there.
Industry executives claim that current immigration policies, which include raising minimum salaries for skilled worker visas and removing electronic engineers from the list of professions in short supply in the UK, are counterproductive.
Neil Deakins, founder of semiconductor recruitment company Easy Resources, described the high costs associated with hiring international employees as “a tax on companies trying to compete.”
Industry leaders insist that the tough stance of both major political parties on immigration is exacerbating the talent shortage, according to Bloomberg.
Bloomberg notes that despite proposed skills strategies to train more Britons, immediate solutions are needed to meet current industry demands.
