From eScience to Impact on the Economy and Society

eScience has had a major impact on science, engineering, healthcare and (increasingly) the humanities. However, there is enormous, largely untapped, potential to use the skills and expertise of eScience researchers to have a major impact on the economy and society. All organisations are drowning in data, but most lack the skills to extract value from it to gain insights into their work, to improve productivity and to create new profitable data-driven products and services. In contrast, eScience researchers have highly relevant experience in solving real-world problems by unlocking the value held in data. In this paper we suggest why this potential has not been fully realised and describe our efforts to address this through the creation of the UK's National Innovation Centre for Data. We draw on our experiences based on discussions with over 160 organisations, and of running 80 collaborative projects with businesses and governmental organisations over the past 4 years. Our vision for the future of eScience is of a field that is not only driving innovative research, but is also having a major, positive impact on the economy and society.