Netflix is targeting a permanent production base in the UK because a boom in demand for studio space is hindering plans to spend more of its $8bn (£6.1bn) annual production budget in Britain.

Netflix, which is making about 40 productions in the UK this year, is understood to have made the UK a high priority for securing a long lease on studio space to ensure its growing slate of UK-based productions can be filmed without delays.

“Netflix is one of the few businesses with enough of a guaranteed slate that means securing their own space to make productions makes sense,” said one movie industry source with knowledge of Netflix’s intentions. “The UK is a target location for a long lease.”

The California-based company indicated its frustrations with the overcrowded UK studio market in a submission this month backing the expansion of one of Britain’s biggest studio complexes, Shepperton, in Surrey, which has hosted productions including Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again. “In 2018, Netflix plans to spend approximately $8bn on content worldwide, across more than 700 television and film productions,” the company said. “We would like to be able to produce more in the UK. However, we are limited by the lack of available space.”

A shortage of filming space has led to a flurry of pop-up studio sites in the UK, including a former military airbase in Yorkshire where the ITV hit Victoria was filmed and a carpet warehouse in Neasden, north London, used as the filming base for another ITV production, Mr Selfridge. More established sites are full. Disney, which is making the latest Star Wars trilogy in the UK, has permanently reserved slots at Pinewood, Shepperton’s sister studio in Buckinghamshire. Warner Brothers has an 80-hectare site at Leavesden where it shot the Harry Potter films and the Fantastic Beasts prequels.

While Netflix is yet to officially enter negotiations to secure long-term studio space in the UK, the need for its own production hub is clear. In July Netflix announced the establishment of its first European production hub, in Madrid, at a new 22,000 sq metre campus called Ciudad de la Tele (TV City), as the company looks to make 20 original productions this year in Spain. Netflix is making double the number of productions in the UK compared to Spain, including new seasons of The Crown and Black Mirror and the historical film The King, which is based on Shakepeare’s King Henry plays and will require more than 20,000 cast, crew and extras.

Netflix is one of many players, including Hollywood studios and TV companies such as the BBC and ITV, that are finding it increasingly difficult to book studio space, potentially costing the UK film and TV industry billions of pounds in lost bookings.

New figures from Pinewood Group suggest that between 2015 and 2017 the UK has missed out on films worth £2.8bn – the cost of making eight Hollywood blockbusters – which have been “lost” to overseas locations as space could not be booked in the UK on the timelines required for shooting.

Victoria is being shot at Church Fenton, a military site in North Yorkshire. Sally Joynson, the chief executive of Screen Yorkshire, said the county was losing business because of a lack of large-scale studio space and turned to Church Fenton – a wartime airbase that moved into private hands after it was decommissioned – to try to solve the problem.

“We made an approach and asked if we could use the site for productions,” said Joynson. “At that point it was effectively a pop-up space. We had to use alternative venues and pop-up spaces. The production we wanted to get in there fell through but because demand was so high Victoria came along.”

In 2013 a tax break for TV productions costing at least £1m an episode was introduced. Last year spend on seven-figure episodes – the definition of a high-end series – rocketed to almost £1bn. Almost three-quarters of that has been financed by deep-pocketed overseas players such as the Netflix/Sony for the co-production of The Crown, HBO for Game of Thrones and Amazon for Outlander. The UK film industry is also riding the crest of the production boom, with investment doubling to £2bn annually in less than a decade.

Netflix and Amazon are estimated to have spent about £150m making shows in the UK last year, as overseas streaming services increased investment in British-made productions by 20% year on year, according to the TV producers association Pact.

Mark Passer, an associate director at Lambert Smith Hampton, a property firm that specialises in film and TV space, said alternative sites such as the Neasden carpet factory were becoming increasingly popular. “ITV invested a significant amount into the property to make it usable due to a lack of availability in traditional studios. Alternative space has had an increasingly important role to play in satisfying demand in the stretched studio market.”

A new report from LSH argues that new production space equivalent to 100 football pitches will be needed in the UK tomeet the demand from the film and high-end TV industry over the next 15 years.

On Monday Jeremy Wright, the new culture secretary, will make one of his first major public appearances to break ground for the final stage of a £200m expansion of Pinewood.

“There has been a huge boom in drama production driven by the likes of Amazon and Netflix,” said Joynson. “There is pressure on locations and studio space; at times supply doesn’t always keep up with demand. It is a very good problem to have, but only if you can find ways to address the issue.”