Advanced Machinery Innovation Fund – UK

This competition is managed on behalf of the Advanced Machinery and Productivity Institute (AMPI). Part of the UKRI Strength in Places Fund (SIPF) programme, AMPI aims to stimulate and support rapid growth of the UK’s machinery manufacturing sector as it transitions to highly integrated digital solutions with sophisticated automated and autonomous systems.

The aim of this competition is to encourage the development of new manufacturing technology within advanced machinery, robotics, automation, or associated industries.

Your project must focus on delivering advancements in machinery for manufacturing and demonstrate innovation at an industrially relevant scale. You must also aim to:

• develop new technology for use in current or future products or manufacturing
• develop and disseminate best practices in technologies or processes to support industry
• demonstrate improvement in business productivity and competitiveness
• show clear benefit technically
• show clear benefit in creating or safeguarding jobs
• enhance capabilities within the broader advanced machinery industry
• demonstrate clear market opportunity, an innovative project, and a credible route to market

Specific Themes

• Target machinery industries include:
  • machine tool manufacturers
  • robotics manufacturers
  • other machine manufacturers
  • machine control system manufacturers
  • providers of digitalisation systems for manufacturing, including sensing and control
  • machinery subsystems manufacturers
  • automation system manufacturers
• Target technologies for machinery include:
  • machine tool, robotic, and automation systems
  • advanced controllers and PLCs
  • in-situ and in-process measurement systems
  • intelligent software systems
  • on-machine sensor networks
  • true digital twins of machinery
  • hybrid and reconfigurable systems
  • sustainable machine development

Project Size

• Your project’s total grant funding request must be between £100,000 and £250,000.

Projects they will not fund

• They will not fund projects that:
  • are outside of the Greater Manchester and West Yorkshire regions ​
  • do not meet the eligibility or scope or are not industry led
  • do not collaborate with a university, academic institution or RTO based inside the Greater Manchester and West Yorkshire regions​
  • are solely capital expenditure or infrastructure projects ​
  • do not evidence the potential for their idea to lead to significant return on investment (ROI), positive economic and regional impact, growth and scale-up of the business

Who can apply?

• Your project
  • Your project must:
    • last between 3 months and 18 months
    • carry out its project work within the Greater Manchester or West Yorkshire regions
    • intend to exploit the results from or in the UK
    • start from 1 November 2024
    • end by 30 April 2026
  • Under current restrictions, this competition will not fund any procurement, commercial, business development or supply chain activity with any Russian or Belarusian entity as lead, partner or subcontractor. This includes any goods or services originating from a Russian or Belarusian source.
• Lead organisation
  • To lead a project your organisation must:
    • be a UK registered business of any size with significant technical operations based within the Greater Manchester or West Yorkshire regions
    • carry out your project work within the defined regions
    • intend to exploit the results from or in the UK
    • involve at least one university, academic institution or research and technology organisation (RTO) based in the Greater Manchester and West Yorkshire regions
• Project team
  • To collaborate with the lead, your organisation must be one of the following UK registered organisations and be based in the Greater Manchester and West Yorkshire regions:
    • business of any size
    • academic institution
    • charity
    • not-for-profit
    • public sector organisation
    • research and technology organisation (RTO)
  • Projects must contain at least one collaborating university, academic institution or RTO.
• Non-funded partners
  • Your project can include partners that do not receive any of this competition’s funding, for example businesses outside of the defined regions. Their costs will count towards the total project costs.
• Subcontractors
  • Subcontractors are allowed in this competition and are limited to no more than 20% of the project’s total costs.
  • Subcontractors can be from anywhere in the UK and you must select them through your usual procurement process.
  • All subcontractor costs must be justified and appropriate to the total project costs.

For more information, visit Innovate UK.