Funding Competition: Creative Catalyst 2024 – UK

Innovate UK, part of UK Research and Innovation, will invest up to £10 million for innovation projects as part of the Creative Catalyst.

The aim of this competition is to support the growth of untapped innovative businesses and to increase investment in creative talent across the UK. They will do this by providing a package of targeted and continuous support to help creative industries businesses to develop innovation that will propel their business growth plans.

They are looking to fund and support a diverse portfolio of innovative award holders. Your project must:

• be from or support the creative industries in the UK
• demonstrate a clearly innovative and ambitious idea which addresses an industry challenge
• be a significant improvement on what is currently on offer in your existing business, with a demonstrable impact to your growth plan
• create a new revenue stream, for example, new products, services or IP
• be market ready within 12 months after project completion
• demonstrate value for money

They encourage proposals that can demonstrate benefit to the wider creative industries sector, especially those that are underrepresented in innovation, for example:

• architecture
• crafts
• photography
• publishing
• radio

Specific Themes

The creative industries projects supported by this fund must focus on one or more of the following subsectors:

• advertising and marketing
• animation
• architecture
• arts and culture
• crafts
• design
• fashion
• film, TV and video
• games
• publishing
• music and radio
• visual art and photography

Project Size

• Your project’s total costs and grant funding request must be up to a maximum of £50,000.

Projects we will not fund

• They are not funding projects that:
  • are not led by a UK registered micro or small business
  • have total project costs and a grant funding in excess of £50,000
  • attribute more than 75% of their costs to subcontractors
  • do not fall within the subsectors of creative industries outlined for Creative Catalyst, for example, construction, education, tourism, manufacturing without demonstrable subsector ties
  • do not intend to use the full award package, for example, requesting just the funding and not the wider support package
  • come from organisations that are not profit driven or do not have a commercial focus, including Community Interest Companies (CICs) and charities
• They cannot fund projects that are:
  • dependent on export performance, for example giving an award to a baker on the condition that they export a certain quantity of bread to another country.
  • dependent on domestic inputs usage, for example if they give an award to a baker on the condition that they use 50% UK flour in their product
• Common reasons they must deem a project as ineligible:
  • £0 is entered in the amount of funding sought
  • the applicant has not provided a video submission link

Who can apply?

• Your project
  • Your project must:
    • start between 1 August 2024 and 1 October 2024
    • end by 31 March 2025
    • last between 3 and 6 months
  • You must carry out all of your project work in the UK and intend to exploit the results from or in the UK.
  • 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 micro or small business
    • have not previously received funding from Innovate UK
    • be from or support the creative industries sector
    • have a demonstrable ambition for growth
    • engage with Innovate UK EDGE to maximise business growth opportunities
    • have operations and a project team based in the UK
  • Organisations that are not profit driven or do not have a commercial focus, including Community Interest Companies (CICs) and charities, are not eligible to receive funding in this competition.
• Subcontractors
  • Subcontractors are allowed in this competition.
  • You cannot attribute more than 75% of your project costs to subcontractors. Your subcontractors can be from anywhere in the UK and you must select them through your usual procurement process.
  • You can use subcontractors from overseas but must make the case in your application as to why you could not use suppliers from the UK.
  • You must also provide a detailed rationale, evidence of the potential UK contractors you approached and the reasons why they were unable to work with you.
  • They expect all subcontractor costs to be justified and appropriate to the total eligible project costs. They will not accept a cheaper cost, or having worked with them previously, as a sufficient reason to use an overseas subcontractor.
• Number of applications
  • An eligible business can only submit one application.

For more information, visit Innovate UK.