TIGA's 5 Point Plan

The comparative shortage of programmers is partly because the proportion of computer science graduates has fallen by a quarter in recent years. Skill shortages are amplified by a brain drain of talented staff to overseas jurisdictions, particularly Canada, facilitated in part by their tax credits. The UK government could help ease skill shortages by incentivising the study of computer science and by maintaining a flexible migration policy. We need to encourage more students from disciplines such as computer science, mathematics and physics to consider a career in the sector. We also need government to ensure that higher education is adequately funded. The UK currently spends 1.2 per cent of GDP on higher education, compared to 2.7 per cent in the USA. The UK cannot be a knowledge economy on the cheap.

In the meantime, we will publish a new TIGA Guide to Careers in the Games Industry to give students information and encouragement to enter the sector, and we will provide new opportunities for students to showcase their work.

If UK studios are to produce the best quality games then they must access the best possible team members and train them effectively. This means that studios must recruit, reward and train staff effectively. During 2012 TIGA will publish: a TIGA Best Practice Recruitment Guide; our annual comprehensive salary survey in conjunction with HR specialists, Aon-Hewitt; and information on industry expenditure on training. Information of this kind will provide developers and digital publishers with information and benchmarking data, enabling them to minimise skill shortages and skill gaps.

TIGA will also continue to strengthen our industry's links with education providers: universities, colleges and Train2Game. Last year we launched the TIGA Education Matching Service, connecting TIGA's university and college members with guest lecturers from the UK games industry. We will develop this service further in 2012 and organise industry-education events. This will intensify industry-academia links, promote knowledge transfer and enhance the quality of higher education provision, ultimately benefiting students and the wider games industry. Developers and education providers also need to work closely together to continue to further improve the quality of education and training. TIGA will make this happen.

Cash

Raising finance is a critical issue for our industry. TIGA research from 2011 showed that over two-fifths of studios have difficulty accessing finance. Too many games businesses struggle to find funds to grow after the earliest, prototype phase. It is hard to raise debt, bond and equity finance because of the high levels of uncertainty about consumer demand and the intangible nature of video game IP. At the same time, games businesses generally have difficulty accessing the few public finance schemes that exist. Poor access to finance is holding back the growth of many games businesses and contributing to the failure of others.

At TIGA we believe that games development and digital publishing is a creative industry with huge economic and educational potential. The UK coalition government recognises the value of the film industry and invests almost £100 million per annum in the sector in the form of a film tax credit and around £30 million in lottery funding; it is time that it appreciates the importance of the UK video games industry and backs the sector. Just as overseas governments in Canada, France, South Korea, the USA and elsewhere invest in their video games industries, so the coalition government should invest in our sector and enable it to compete for investment on a level playing field.

In 2012 TIGA will lead the UK games industry in fighting for the introduction of a well-targeted tax break for games production, with a higher level of tax relief for small studios, in order to reduce the cost of game development and to enable the UK games industry to compete on a level playing field. We will push for the establishment of a Creative Content Fund to provide match funding on a pound for pound basis up to a maximum of £100,000 in order to improve access to finance for small studios.

We will campaign for an extension in the scope of the Small Firms Research & Development Tax Credits to help more indie developers and digital publishers. We will press for tax relief on training, to enable small studios to offset expenditure on training against corporation tax. These measures will provide developers and digital publishers with more money to build and to grow their businesses.

The UK games industry is a success story, but some studios are not sustainable. TIGA has a plan that will make the UK games industry successful, sustainable and realise its potential. TIGA will tackle these issues - counsel, connections, costs, careers and cash - and so support the growth and viability of more independent content creators and digital publishers in 2012. Join us and together we can make this vision a reality.