Funding Competition: New Innovators in Digital Technology, North East England (UK)

Innovate UK will work with North East Local Enterprise Partnership and North of Tyne Combined Authority to invest up to £1.5 million in innovation projects. This funding is from Innovate UK’s Launchpad programme. The Launchpad programme supports the UK government’s goals in the Levelling Up White Paper.

The aim of this competition is to provide a package of targeted support to enable ambitious UK registered micro and small businesses to develop highly innovative ideas that have a clear route to commercialisation and business growth. Innovate UK is offering UK registered micro and small businesses a share of the funding through this competition. In addition to the grant support, you will be offered tailored business support delivered by local business innovation experts and Innovate UK Business Growth.

The businesses will use the funding to grow their innovation activities in the digital technology cluster in North East England, both during and after the project. For this competition, North East England consists of Northumberland, Tyne and Wear, and County Durham.

Growing or emerging markets, include but are not limited to:

• advanced manufacturing
• agriculture and forestry
• automotive and transportation
• creative industries
• culture, tourism, leisure and sport
• green industries
• health
• offshore industries
• retail and town centre

Specific Themes

• Your project can focus on one or more of the following:
  • Immersive technologies
    • extended reality
    • digital twins
    • games engines
    • virtual production
  • Artificial intelligence
    • data science
    • machine learning
    • neural networks
    • computer vision
    • robotics
    • large language models
    • quantum computing

Project Size

• Your project’s total costs and grant funding request must be between £25,000 and £50,000.

Projects they will not fund

• They are not funding projects that:
  • do not meet the competition eligibility or scope requirements
  • purely result in reports, academic papers or similar
  • do not evidence value for money
• They cannot fund projects that:
  • involve primary production in fishery and aquaculture
  • involve primary production in agriculture
  • have activities relating to the purchase of road freight transport
  • are not allowed under De minimis regulation restrictions
  • are not eligible to receive Minimal Financial Assistance

Who can apply?

• Your project
  • Your project must:
    • have a grant funding request between £25,000 and £50,000
    • have total project costs that equal your grant funding request
    • last between three and six months in duration
    • intend to exploit the results from or in the UK
    • help to grow your innovation activities during and after the project in the innovation cluster
    • start between 1 October 2024 and 1 January 2025
    • end by 31 March 2025
• Lead organisation
  • To lead a project your organisation must be a UK registered micro or small business.
  • If your business has been funded directly by Innovate UK previously, you are not eligible to be offered funding through this competition.
  • If you have only received funding directly from Innovate UK Business Growth (previously named Innovate UK EDGE) or a Catapult scheme, you are eligible to apply for this competition.
  • Businesses with directors who have previously received a grant or Innovation Loan from Innovate UK as part of a different company, are eligible to apply but will be considered on a case-by-case basis.
  • A business with a previous award to a parent or subsidiary would also be eligible to apply, but the parent company must be classified as a micro or small business. Applications will be considered on a case-by-case basis.
• Subcontractors
  • Subcontractors are allowed in this competition.
  • Subcontractors can be from anywhere in the UK and you must select them through your usual procurement process.

For more information, visit Innovate UK.