ICHP has been involved in developing a new regulatory sandbox which will be delivered in partnership with the Medicines & Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, NHS England (London Region) and the three London heath innovation networks.
Here, Dr Dominique Allwood and Abeer Itrakjy share how the London Region I sandbox aims to create the conditions for innovation adoption and spread.
Every day, new technologies are developed with the potential to improve outcomes, reduce inequalities and help people live healthier lives. Advances in artificial intelligence, digital health and data science are creating opportunities that would have seemed unimaginable only a few years ago. Yet too few innovations make the journey from promising pilot to widespread adoption. The challenge is not invention. It is creating the conditions that allow innovation to be adopted, trusted and scaled.
This matters now more than ever. The pace of technological change is accelerating at the same time as health systems face unprecedented demand, workforce pressures and widening inequalities. While innovation continues to move quickly, the systems responsible for evaluating, adopting and scaling it often struggle to keep pace. Too often, innovators, providers and regulators find themselves operating in parallel rather than together, creating uncertainty and delays that slow the route from idea to impact.
This is why regulatory sandboxes are attracting growing interest across healthcare.
What is a regulatory sandbox?
Regulatory sandboxes create controlled environments where innovators, regulators and healthcare organisations can work together to test new technologies, generate evidence and understand risks in real-world settings. The aim is not to lower standards or bypass regulation. Rather, it is to create opportunities to learn earlier, build confidence faster and develop regulatory approaches alongside technological advances, rather than after them.
Financial services pioneered the sandbox approach through initiatives such as the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) Regulatory Sandbox. Since its launch in 2016, it has enabled firms to test innovations ranging from digital identity solutions and open banking platforms to AI-enabled fraud detection and risk management tools under regulatory supervision. More recently, the FCA’s ‘Supercharged Sandbox’, developed with Nvidia, has created opportunities for organisations to experiment safely with advanced AI technologies. Beyond supporting individual companies, these initiatives have helped regulators learn alongside innovators, shaping future policy and creating greater clarity for the wider market.
Healthcare is embracing similar approaches internationally. In Dubai, for example, the Dubai Health Authority has established a health regulatory sandbox to enable the safe testing of digital health, AI, telehealth and genomics solutions in real clinical environments. By creating a structured route for innovators, providers and regulators to work together, these programmes have accelerated evidence generation, supported adoption and strengthened health innovation ecosystems.
Evolving regulation alongside technological advances
As Chair of Imperial College Health Partners, Professor Sir Mark Walport brings a unique perspective on this challenge. During his time as the UK’s Government Chief Scientific Adviser, he was a strong advocate for ensuring that regulation and policy evolve alongside scientific and technological advances, enabling innovation to thrive while maintaining public trust. Perhaps the most important lesson from these examples is that regulation can be a catalyst for innovation, not simply a gatekeeper to it.
At Imperial College Health Partners, we have been working with colleagues across London, including the Medicines & Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), NHS England (London Region), our fellow London health innovation networks and wider partners, to help shape and develop the regulatory sandbox approach for London. As organisations whose purpose is to accelerate the adoption and spread of innovation, health innovation networks have a role not simply to identify promising technologies, but to help create the conditions in which they can be adopted safely, effectively and at scale.
Creating the conditions for adoption and spread
Through our work supporting innovation adoption across North West London and nationally, one lesson has become increasingly clear: successful adoption rarely depends on the technology alone. It depends on whether organisations can establish the right governance, generate meaningful evidence, engage clinicians and patients, redesign pathways and build the confidence needed for sustainable change. Introducing a new tool is often the easy part. Embedding it into the reality of healthcare delivery is where the real work begins.
That is why we see such potential in the sandbox approach. By bringing together innovators, regulators, healthcare organisations and patients from the outset, it creates a shared environment for learning. Questions around safety, effectiveness, operational impact and equity can be explored together, helping to generate both the evidence and trust needed for wider adoption.
London is particularly well placed to be the first NHS region to adopt a regulatory sandbox approach with world-class academic institutions, a thriving life sciences sector, internationally recognised NHS organisations and one of the most diverse populations anywhere in the world. Technology alone does not transform healthcare. Transformation happens when innovation is combined with evidence, implementation, trust and continuous learning.
Regulatory sandboxes offer a powerful mechanism for bringing those elements together and we are pleased to be working alongside our partners in London to launch and deliver the first MHRA regulatory sandbox – London Region I – driving rapid, real-world deployment of devices that can help meet the most pressing healthcare challenges in the region.
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Read more about the London Region I sandbox here.