Call for Applications: Games Scale Up Fund for Wales (United Kingdom)

The fund is designed to meet the needs of the Welsh games industry by providing additional funding for growth, talent, and skills development.

Funding Information

• UK Games Talent and Finance CIC is collaborating with Creative Wales to administer this fund, which will offer £50,000 to £150,000 for games-for-entertainment content.

Eligible Projects

• Requirements:
  • Prototype in place,
  • IP at least 51% developed and owned by the applicant or licensed on terms that are aligned with the project’s long-term requirements,
  • Your project must not include gambling elements or mechanisms which could be perceived as such, or any content that they deem to be potentially reputationally damaging (solely at their discretion),
  • A primary focus of the applicant’s current development portfolio,
  • Games for entertainment focus with potential to secure a commercial audience at scale,
  • Eligible costs are staff and contractor costs for hands-on development activity in Wales,
  • Ineligible projects include non-entertainment games, student projects/graduation works, games incapable of obtaining a PEGI rating, corporate/marketing functions (etc),
  • Evidence of understanding of the target audience and plans to access that audience,
  • A credible funding rationale in terms of scale of the request for grant funding in the context of company finances, and
  • Ability to demonstrate additionality of this funding.
• Preferences:
  • Project IP originated and developed by the applicant.
  • Use of this funding early / mid development cycle.
  • Funding to be spent over a 6–12 month period commencing within four weeks of offer, but applications outside this range will be considered. Financial year end issues may need to be managed in project plans and they will advise if that is the case.

Eligibility Criteria

• Requirements:
  • Wales-registered SME with PAYE employees engaged in games development work in the UK,
  • Ownership explicitly set out and with Wales-based founder-director/s as significant shareholder/s,
  • This funding is being operated within the terms of the minimum financial assistance (MFA) exemption. The total previous MFA grant and other MFA subsidies must not exceed £315,000 over a three-year fiscal period (including any prior funding from them) in order to comply with UK subsidy control legislation.
  • Not presently facing any acute working capital challenges or liabilities that put the business under any unusual levels of risk, and
  • The founders able to fully articulate the rationale for all structural aspects of the business and the growth strategy in the context of building and growing a financially-sustainable Wales-based games development studio and growing PAYE employment, particularly where there are any non-standard business configurations such as dispersed teams / high levels of contracting.
• Preference:
  • They normally expect companies to not be a recently established start-up, or formed for the purposes of securing this grant. A start-up may be considered where supported by the founders’ effective articulation of the structural rationale as above alongside an immediate publishing opportunity secured because of founder track record.
  • Some PAYE employees already onboard, in addition to the founding director/s.
  • If previously funded by UKGTF or Creative Wales, being able to demonstrate positive business progress as a result of the earlier support.
  • Prior founder(s) track record having developed video games.

For more information, visit UK Games Talent and Finance Community Interest Company.