Innovate UK Investor Partnerships: SME (Round 4)

Innovate UK, as part of UK Research and Innovation, has selected a pool of investor partners. These investor partners have demonstrated that they have the credibility, capability, capacity and appetite to invest in innovative, technology-led businesses that align with the programmes.

The aim of this competition is to provide you with support for research and development and access to the capital investment you need to develop and commercialise your innovations.

These programmes will focus on the future economy and brings together:

• Innovate UK’s expertise in identifying innovation and using grant funding to change the risk profile of businesses
• Investor partners’ aligned funding and expertise in identifying opportunities and teams that can best use extra investment finance.

Specific Themes

• Future Economy
  • Net Zero
    • capital intensive technologies
    • power – particularly offshore wind, civil nuclear, hydrogen, carbon capture and storage, and whole systems integration
    • heating and retrofit
    • critical circular materials
    • battery technologies for transport and energy storage (Faraday Battery Challenge)
    • resource efficiency for materials and manufacturing – no longer in scope as funding has been fully committed in earlier rounds
    • mobility – no longer in scope as funding has been fully committed in earlier rounds
  • Health and Wellbeing
    • innovative solutions to health and healthcare challenges (Biomedical Catalyst)
    • advancing life-changing cancer therapeutics, focussed on immunotherapies and paediatric oncology (Cancer Therapeutics)
    • the application of extended reality for digital mental health, including immersive content that could be delivered as a digital mental health therapeutic in formal healthcare settings (Mindset)
  • Next generation digital technologies
    • projects within the creative industries which are underpinned by innovative digital technology as well as sustainable innovations, such as circular fashion (Creative Catalyst)
    • projects underpinned by artificial intelligence and machine learning which boost business productivity in four target industries
    • projects underpinned by artificial intelligence and machine learning which boost business productivity in internal business processes
    • projects that accelerate the adoption of trusted and responsible AI technologies by reducing bottlenecks during development and deployment of these technologies (BridgeAI)
  • No Limits (equality, diversity and inclusion)
    • innovations from diverse founders or senior decision-makers that are from under-represented groups and are role models
    • innovations outside of the future economy theme areas, including those that support under-served communities and groups
• They encourage innovation involving communities that are typically under-represented, including:
  • from regions that have historically accessed lower levels of investment (outside London, Oxford and Cambridge)
  • ethnic minority groups
  • women and other marginalised genders
  • disabled people
  • people with non-traditional education backgrounds.

Research Categories

• Feasibility studies:
  • This means analysis and evaluation of a project’s potential, aimed at supporting the process of decision making.
  • This is achieved by uncovering its strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats as well as identifying the resources needed and the prospects for success.
  • Feasibility studies will usually help businesses decide to work either individually or collaboratively with other industrial or research organisations, before conducting a subsequent larger project.
  • Individual competition scopes will define their own requirements for feasibility studies in terms of project size and length.
• Industrial research:
  • This means planned research or critical investigation to gain new knowledge and skills. This should be for the purpose of product development, processes or services that lead to an improvement in existing products, processes or services.
  • It can include the creation of component parts to complex systems and may include prototypes in a laboratory or environment with simulated interfaces to existing systems, particularly for generic technology validation.
• Experimental development:
  • ‘Experimental development’ means acquiring, combining, shaping and using existing scientific, technological, business and other relevant knowledge and skills with the aim of developing new or improved products, processes or services.
  • This may also include, for example, activities aimed at the conceptual definition, planning and documentation of new products, processes or services.
  • Experimental development may comprise prototyping, demonstrating, piloting, testing and validation of new or improved products, processes or services in environments representative of real life operating conditions.
  • The primary objective is to make further technical improvements on products, processes or services that are not substantially set.
  • This may include the development of a commercially usable prototype or pilot which is not necessarily the final commercial product and which is too expensive to produce for it to be used only for demonstration and validation purposes.
  • Experimental development does not include routine or periodic changes made to existing products, production lines, manufacturing processes, services and other operations in progress, even if those changes may represent improvements.

Funding Information

• For feasibility studies projects:
  • your total project costs must be between £50,000 and £300,000
  • the project duration must be between 6 and 12 months
• For industrial research projects:
  • your total project costs must be between £100,000 and £1 million
  • the project duration must be between 6 and 24 months
• For experimental development projects:
  • your total project costs must be between £250,000 and £2 million
  • the project duration must be between 12 and 24 months.

Eligibility Criteria

To apply your organisation must:

• be a UK registered micro, small or medium sized business (SME)
• carry out its project work in or from the UK
• intend to exploit the results in or from the UK
• have discussed and agreed your proposal with your investor partner before submitting your application
• The funding rates you can receive will depend on the size and type of your organisation and your role in the project. Organisations fall into three categories:
  • businesses
  • research organisations
  • public sector organisations or charities undertaking research activity.
  • Each participant must determine under which type of organisation it would be classified. Innovate UK is unable to advise which organisation type should be selected.

Ineligible Projects

• not carried out by SMEs
• collaborative R&D projects
• not part of a company’s growth plan
• unable to demonstrate there is potential for return on investment and growth
• not working with an investor partner from the selected pool of investor partners
• dependent on export performance
• dependent on domestic inputs usage.

For more information, visit Gov.UK.