Canada-UK: Biomanufacturing of Biologics and Advanced Therapies Round 2
UK registered organisations can apply for a share of up to £3 million for collaboration with Canadian SMEs on joint R&D projects, for enabling technologies and innovations in biomanufacturing of biologics and advanced therapies.
- Competition opens: Wednesday 8 May 2024
- Competition closes: Wednesday 16 October 2024 11:00am
Or sign in to continue an existing application.
Competition sections
Description
Innovate UK, part of UK Research and Innovation, will work with the National Research Council of Canada Industrial Research Assistance Program (NRC IRAP) to invest up to £3 million in innovation projects.
The aim of this competition is to stimulate the development and implementation of innovative technologies in biomanufacturing. The objective is to build the desired flexibility and technical capabilities required for the development and economically sustainable production of the next generation vaccines and therapies.
The bilateral research and development (R&D) collaborations between the UK and Canada will enable both countries to be well positioned to respond to future health emergencies.
Your proposal must contribute to the development of innovative technology that enables flexible, scalable, efficient and cost effective manufacturing of novel biological therapeutic products and delivery systems. It must demonstrate high potential for commercialisation.
In applying to this competition, you are entering into a competitive process.
This competition closes at 11am UK time, which is 9am PDT and 12pm EDT, on the deadline stated in this Innovate UK competition brief. We cannot guarantee other government or third party sites will always show the correct competition information.
Funding type
Grant
Project size
The total grant funding request for all UK partners can be up to £600,000 for each application. The total funding request for all Canadian partners combined can be up to CA$1 million for each application.
Accessibility and Inclusion
We welcome and encourage applications from people of all backgrounds and are committed to making our application process accessible to everyone. This includes making reasonable adjustments, for people who have a disability or a long-term condition and face barriers applying to us.
You can contact us at any time to ask for guidance.
We recommend you contact us at least 15 working days before this competition’s closing date to allow us to put the most suitable support in place. The support we can provide may be limited if you contact us close to the competition deadline.
You can contact Innovate UK by email or call 0300 321 4357. Our phone lines are open from 9am to 12pm and 2pm to 5pm UK time, Monday to Friday (excluding bank holidays).
Who can apply
Text update 12 July 2024: 'Project team' number of organisations in a collaboration edited.
Canada specific rules
Canadian funding applicants are required to register and submit an expression of interest (EoI) before being eligible to apply for this competition.
The registration deadline for Canadian micro, small or medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) is 2 July 2024.
Canadian funding applicants who do not complete an EoI and have not been invited to proceed will not be eligible for funding through this competition.
Please see the National Research Council of Canada Industrial Research Assistance Program (NRC IRAP) call page for more information in English and French on Canadian eligibility requirements and to register.
UK participants must be part of an application submitted to Innovate UK. Canadian partners must submit a parallel application to NRC.
UK applications will be assessed by Innovate UK. Your Canadian partners’ proposal is reviewed by NRC. Innovate UK and NRC are jointly responsible for the decision to fund your project.
In order to receive any grant funding, your project proposal must be successful on both sides of the consortium. If successful, UK participants will receive grant funding from Innovate UK and Canadian participants will receive grant funding from NRC.
Your project
Your project must:
- have a grant funding request of no more than £600,000 allocated to UK organisations
- have a total grant funding request for Canadian partners of no more than CA$1 million
- start by 1 April 2025
- end by 31 March 2027
- last between 12 and 24 months
Projects must always start on the first of the month and this must be stated within your application. Your project start date will be reflected in your grant offer letter if you are successful.
Projects should have a balanced contribution of the total eligible project costs among the partners from the participating partner countries. No one country or project partner can represent more than 70% of the total project cost.
The majority of the project work must be undertaken in the UK and Canada.
Your proposal must demonstrate a clear intention to commercially exploit the results of the project domestically or globally.
You must only include eligible project costs in your application.
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.
If your project’s grant funding request or duration falls outside of our eligibility criteria, you must provide justification by email to support@iuk.ukri.org at least 10 working days before the competition closes. We will decide whether to approve your request.
If you have not requested approval or your application has not been approved by us, you will be made ineligible. Your application will then not be sent for assessment.
Lead organisation
To lead a project your organisation must be either:
- a UK registered business of any size
or
Your collaboration must involve at least one grant claiming UK registered SME and one eligible Canadian incorporated, profit orientated SME.
UK application lead organisation
Only eligible UK registered businesses can start an application on the Innovation Funding Service (IFS) platform.
Canadian partners must not be invited onto IFS. Their involvement in the project is listed as part of your answers to the questions. If you include a grant claiming Canadian partner in your IFS application you will be made ineligible and your application will not be sent for assessment.
To lead a UK application your organisation must:
- be a UK registered business of any size
- be or involve at least one grant claiming UK registered micro, small or medium-sized enterprise (SME)
- partner with a Canadian registered SME, which must be a separate non-linked entity to the UK project partners
- include at least one further eligible grant claiming partner from either the UK or Canada
Projects must always start on the first of the month and this must be stated within your application. Your project start date will be reflected in your grant offer letter if you are successful.
More information on the different types of organisation can be found in our Funding rules.
Academic institutions and research and technology organisations (RTOs) cannot lead.
Project team
All collaborations must include at least two eligible organisations from Canada and the UK as part of the project.
UK Team - To collaborate with the lead, your organisation must be one of the following UK registered:
- business of any size
- academic institution
- charity
- not for profit
- public sector organisation
- research and technology organisation (RTO)
Each UK partner organisation must be invited into the Innovation Funding Service (IFS) by the lead to collaborate on a project. Once partners have accepted the invitation, they will be asked to login or to create an account in IFS. They are responsible for entering their own project costs and completing their Project Impact questions in the application.
Non-funded partners
Your project can include partners that do not receive any of this competition’s funding. Their costs will count towards the total project costs.
Canadian project participants who are not eligible for funding, including large enterprises and industries, are welcome to collaborate as additional participants on a self‑funded basis or as subcontractors.
Subcontractors
Subcontractors are allowed in this competition.
For UK organisations, the cost of subcontractors is limited to no more than 20% of your organisation’s total eligible costs.
All subcontractors must be selected through your usual procurement process.
You can use subcontractors from the UK and Canada.
If you wish to use subcontractors from other countries you must make the case in your application as to why you could not use suppliers from the countries providing grant funding for the project.
You must provide a detailed rationale, evidence of the potential UK or Canadian contractors you approached and the reasons why they were unable to work with you. We will not accept a cheaper cost as a sufficient reason to use a subcontractor from a third country.
All subcontractor costs must be justified and appropriate to the total project costs.
Number of applications
A UK business can only lead on one application but can be included as a collaborator in one further application.
A UK business that is not leading an application can collaborate on a maximum of two applications.
A Canadian SME may only participate in one application either as a lead or collaborator.
Academic institutions or RTOs can collaborate in any number of applications.
Use of animals in research and innovation
Innovate UK expects and supports the provision and safeguarding of welfare standards for animals used in research and innovation, according to best practice and up to date guidance.
Applicants must ensure that all of the proposed work within projects, both that in the UK and internationally, will comply with the UKRI guidance on the use of animals in research and innovation.
Any projects selected for funding which involve animals will be asked to provide additional information on welfare and ethical considerations, as well as compliance with any relevant legislation as part of the project start-up process. This information will be reviewed before an award is made.
Previous applications
You can use a previously submitted application to apply for this competition.
You can make a maximum of two submissions to Innovate UK with any given proposal. If Innovate UK judges that your proposal is not materially different from your previous proposal, it will be counted towards this maximum.
If your application goes through to assessment and is unsuccessful, you can reapply with the same proposal once more.
We will not award you funding if you have:
- failed to exploit a previously funded project
- an overdue independent accountant’s report
- failed to comply with grant terms and conditions
Subsidy control (and State aid where applicable)
This competition provides funding in line with the Subsidy Control Act 2022. Further information about the Subsidy requirements can be found within the Subsidy Control Act 2022 (legislation.gov.uk).
Innovate UK is unable to award organisations that are considered to be in financial difficulty. We will conduct financial viability and eligibility tests to confirm this is not the case following the application stage.
EU State aid rules now only apply in limited circumstances. Please see the Windsor Framework to check if these rules apply to your organisation.
Further Information
If you are unsure about your obligations under the Subsidy Control Act 2022 or the State aid rules, you should take independent legal advice. We are unable to advise on individual eligibility or legal obligations.
You must always make sure that the funding awarded to you is compliant with all current Subsidy Control legislation applicable in the United Kingdom.
This aims to regulate any advantage granted by a public sector body which threatens to, or actually distorts competition in the United Kingdom or any other country or countries.Funding
Selected collaborative R&D projects will be eligible to receive funding from their respective national funding body.
Up to £3 million from Innovate UK and up to CA$6 million from the National Research Council of Canada Industrial Research Assistance Program (NRC IRAP) and the NRC Collaborative Science and Technology Innovation Program (NRC CSTIP), an equivalent of £6.5 million in total, has been allocated to fund innovation projects in this competition. Funding will be in the form of a grant.
UK Organisations
If the majority of your organisation’s work on the project is commercial or economic, your funding request must not exceed the limits below. These limits apply even if your organisation normally acts non-economically but for the purpose of this project will be undertaking commercial or economic activity.
For feasibility studies and industrial research projects, you could get funding for your eligible project costs of:
- up to 70% if you are a micro or small organisation
- up to 60% if you are a medium sized organisation
- up to 50% if you are a large organisation
For experimental development projects which are nearer to market, you could get funding for your eligible project costs of:
- up to 45% if you are a micro or small organisation
- up to 35% if you are a medium sized organisation
- up to 25% if you are a large organisation
For more information on company sizes, please refer to the company accounts guidance.
If you are applying for an award funded under State aid Regulations, the definitions are set out in the European Commission Recommendation of 6 May 2003.
Research participation for UK organisations
UK research organisations undertaking non-economic activity as part of the project can share up to 30% of the UK partners’ total eligible project costs. If your consortium contains more than one research organisation undertaking non-economic activity, this maximum is shared between them.
Of that 30% you could get funding for your eligible project costs of up to:
- 80% of full economic costs (FEC) if you are a Je-S registered institution such as an academic
- 100% of your project costs if you are an RTO
Canadian SMEs
Eligible Canadian SMEs may receive from NRC IRAP up to 50% reimbursement of eligible project costs up to a maximum total funding amount of CA$1 million.
Other Canadian Collaborators
See the Canadian call page for more information in English and French on other Canadian collaborators eligibility and funding.
Your proposal
This competition will support collaborative research and development (CR&D) in biomanufacturing through Canadian and UK partnerships.
The aim of this competition is to stimulate the development and implementation of innovative technologies in biomanufacturing. The objective is to build the desired flexibility and technical capabilities required for the development and economically sustainable production of the next generation vaccines and therapies.
Your joint Canadian and UK project can focus on one or more of the following:
Enabling technologies for biologics and advanced therapeutics
- discovery, design and high throughput screening platforms, which may include the application of artificial intelligence
- manufacturing systems and methods, for example: centralised, distributed or point‑of‑care; microfluidics‑based devices, new and innovative systems for Good Manufacturing Practice production, fill and finish, automation security
- manufacturing process intensification enablers, for example: hyper productive strains, novel expression systems, continuous production processes, perfusion technologies
- novel analytical characterization, potency assays and real‑time release technologies, biosensors
- other relevant enabling technologies
Delivery systems for proteins and nucleic acids
- viral and non‑viral (for example, lipid nanoparticles) platforms, including their components and payloads
Novel biological products
- vaccines, for example: prophylactic, therapeutic and various platforms
- therapeutic proteins, for example: antibodies, and related production process‑intensification enablers
- advanced therapy medicinal products, for example: mRNA, siRNA, gene therapies, cell therapies engineered tissues
- other biological based therapies, for example: bacteriophage, engineered probiotics
Portfolio approach
We want to fund a variety of projects across different technologies and themes. We call this a portfolio approach.
Research categories
We will fund feasibility projects, industrial research projects and experimental development projects, as defined in the guidance on categories of research.
Projects we will not fund
We are not funding projects that are:
- for nutraceutical product development
- manufacturing process innovations using a non-human medicine as the product
We cannot fund projects that are:
- dependent on export performance, for example, giving a subsidy to a baker on the condition that it exports a certain quantity of bread to another country
- dependent on domestic inputs usage, for example, giving a subsidy to a baker on the condition that it uses 50% UK flour in their product
- 8 May 2024
- Competition opens
- 16 May 2024
- Online briefing event: watch the recordingBriefing slides are now available to download from Supporting Information
- 2 July 2024
- Canadian EoI registration deadline
- 15 July 2024
- Canadian EoI submission deadline
- 16 October 2024 11:00am
- Competition closes
- 6 January 2025
- Applicants notified
Before you start
You must read the guidance on applying for a competition on the Innovation Funding Service before you start.
If you are a Canadian applicant, you must be successful in your expression of interest (EoI) application to National Research Council of Canada (NRC) to apply for this competition.
Before submitting, it is the UK lead applicant’s responsibility to make sure:
- that all the information provided in the application is correct
- your proposal meets the eligibility and scope criteria
- all sections of the application are marked as complete
- that all partners have completed all assigned sections and accepted the terms and conditions (T&Cs)
You can reopen your application once submitted, up until the competition deadline. You must resubmit the application before the competition deadline.
What we ask you
The application is split into four sections:
- Project details.
- Application questions.
- Finances.
- Project Impact.
Accessibility and Inclusion
We welcome and encourage applications from people of all backgrounds and are committed to making our application process accessible to everyone. This includes making reasonable adjustments, for people who have a disability or a long-term condition and face barriers applying to us.
You can contact us at any time to ask for guidance.
We recommend you contact us at least 15 working days before this competition’s closing date to allow us to put the most suitable support in place. The support we can provide may be limited if you contact us close to the competition deadline.
You can contact Innovate UK by email or call 0300 321 4357. Our phone lines are open from 9am to 12pm and 2pm to 5pm UK time, Monday to Friday (excluding bank holidays).
1. Project details
This section provides background for your application and is not scored.
Application team
Decide which organisations will work with you on your project and invite people from those organisations to help complete the application.
Canadian partners must not be invited onto Innovate UK’s IFS application platform. Their involvement in the project is listed as part of your answers to the questions. If you include a grant claiming Canadian partner in your IFS application you will be made ineligible and your application will not be sent for assessment.
Application details
Give your project’s title, start date and duration.
Research category
Select the type of research you will undertake.
Project summary
Describe your project briefly and be clear about what makes it innovative. We use this section to assign the right experts to assess your application.
Your answer can be up to 400 words long.
Public description
Describe your project in detail and in a way that you are happy to see published. Do not include any commercially sensitive information. If we award your project funding, we will publish this description. This could happen before you start your project.
Your answer can be up to 400 words long.
Scope
Describe how your project fits the scope of the competition. If your project is not in scope, it will not be sent for assessment. We will tell you the reason why.
Your answer can be up to 400 words long.2. Application questions
Your application will be assessed by independent assessors in both the UK and Canada.
The assessors will score all your answers apart from questions 1 to 4. You will receive feedback for each scored question. Find out more about how our assessors assess and how we select applications for funding.
You must answer all questions. Your answer to each question can be up to 400 words long. Do not include any website addresses (URLs) in your answers.
Question 1. Applicant location (not scored)
You must state the name and full registered address of your UK organisation, Canadian partners and any subcontractors working on your project.
We are collecting this information to understand the geographical location of all applicants.
Question 2. Animal testing (not scored)
Will your project involve any trials with animals or animal testing?
You must select one option:
- Yes
- No
We will only support innovation projects conducted to the highest standards of animal welfare.
Further information for proposals involving animal testing is available at the UKRI Good Research Hub and NC3R’s animal welfare guidance.
Question 3. Permits and licences (not scored)
Will you have the correct permits and licences in place to carry out your project?
We are unable to fund projects who do not have the correct permits or licences in place by your project start date.
You must select one option:
- Yes
- No
- In process of being applied for
- Not applicable
Question 4. Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (not scored)
How have you incorporated equality, diversity and inclusion into your project delivery and project outcomes?
Describe details of the challenges or opportunities relating to equality, diversity and inclusion arising from your project and the methods and approaches used to address them:
- during project delivery
- for governance
- for project team and advisory boards
- for stakeholder and end-user engagement
- for design thinking
Note: Questions relating to equality, diversity and inclusion will not form part of the funding decision but will be used to inform the development of EDI activities for the competition cohort.
Question 5. Need or challenge
What is the business need, technological challenge, or market opportunity behind your innovation?
Explain:
- the main motivation for the project
- the business need, technological challenge or market opportunity
- whether you have identified any similar innovation and its current limitations, including those close to market or in development
- any work you have already done to respond to this need, for example, if the project focuses on developing an existing capability or building a new one
- the wider economic, social, environmental, cultural or political challenges which are influential in creating the opportunity, such as incoming regulations
Question 6. Approach and innovation
What approach will you take and where will the focus of the innovation be?
Explain:
- how you will respond to the need, challenge or opportunity identified
- how you will improve on any similar innovation that you have identified
- whether the innovation will focus on existing technologies in new areas, the development of new technologies for existing areas, or a totally disruptive approach
- the freedom you have to operate
- how this project fits with your current product, service lines or offerings
- how it will make you more competitive
- the nature of the outputs you expect from the project, for example, reports, demonstrator, know-how, new process, product or service design, and how these will help you to target the need, challenge or opportunity identified
You can submit one appendix to support your answer. It can include diagrams and charts. It must be a PDF, up to 2 A4 pages long and no larger than 10MB in size. The font must be legible at 100% zoom.
Question 7. Team and resources
Who is in the project team and what are their roles?
Explain:
- the roles, skills and experience of all members of the project team that are relevant to the approach you will be taking
- the resources, equipment and facilities needed for the project and how you will access them
- the details of any vital external parties, including subcontractors, who you will need to work with to successfully carry out the project
- the current relationships between project partners and how these will change as a result of the project
- any roles you will need to recruit for
You can submit one appendix, with a short summary of the main people working on the project to support your answer. It must be a PDF, up to 4 A4 pages long and no larger than 10MB in size. The font must be legible at 100% zoom.
Question 8. Market awareness
What does the market or markets you are targeting look like?
Describe:
- the target markets for the project outcomes and any other potential markets, either domestic, international or both
- the size of the target markets for the project outcomes, backed up by references where available
- the structure and dynamics of the target markets, including customer segmentation, together with predicted growth rates within clear timeframes
- the target markets’ main supply or value chains and business models, and any barriers to entry that exist
- the current UK position in targeting these markets
- the size and main features of any other markets not already listed
If your project is highly innovative, where the market may be unexplored, describe or explain:
- what the market’s size might be
- how your project will try to explore the market’s potential
Question 9. Outcomes and route to market
How are you going to grow your business and increase long term productivity as a result of the project?
Explain:
- your current position in the markets and supply or value chains outlined, and whether you will be extending or establishing your market position
- your target customers or end users, and the value to them, for example, why they would use or buy your product
- your route to market
- how you are going to profit from the innovation, including increased revenues or cost reduction
- how the innovation will affect your productivity and growth, in both the short and the long term
- how you will protect and exploit the outputs of the project, for example, through know-how, patenting, designs or changes to your business model
- your strategy for targeting the other markets you have identified during or after the project
If there is any research organisation activity in the project, describe:
- your plans to spread the project’s research outputs over a reasonable timescale
- how you expect to use the results generated from the project in further research activities
Question 10. Wider impacts
What impact might this project have outside the project team?
Describe and, where possible, measure the economic benefits from the project such as productivity increases and import substitution, to:
- external parties
- customers
- others in the supply chain
- broader industry
- the UK and Canadian economies
Describe and, where possible, measure:
- any expected impact on UK and Canadian government priorities
- any expected environmental impacts, either positive or negative
- any expected regional impacts of the project
Describe any expected social impacts, either positive or negative, on, for example:
- quality of life
- social inclusion or exclusion
- jobs, such as safeguarding, creating, changing or displacing them
- education
- public empowerment
- health and safety
- regulations
- diversity
Question 11. Project management
How will you manage your project effectively?
Explain:
- the main work packages of your project, indicating the lead partner assigned to each and the total cost of each one
- your approach to project management, identifying any major tools and mechanisms you will use to get a successful and innovative project outcome
- the management reporting lines
- your project plan in enough detail to identify any links or dependencies between work packages or milestones
You must submit a project plan or Gantt chart as an appendix to support your answer. It must be a PDF, up to 2 A4 pages long and no larger than 10MB in size. The font must be legible at 100% zoom.
Question 12. Risks
What are the main risks for this project?
Explain:
- the main risks and uncertainties of the project, including the technical, commercial, managerial and environmental risks
- how you will mitigate these risks
- any project inputs that are critical to completion, such as resources, expertise, and data sets
- any output likely to be subject to regulatory requirements, certification, ethical issues and other requirements identified, and how you will manage this
You must submit a risk register as an appendix to support your answer. It must be a PDF, up to 2 A4 pages long, and no larger than 10MB in size. The font must be legible at 100% zoom.
Question 13. Added value
How will this public funding help you to accelerate or enhance your approach to developing your project towards commercialisation? What impact would this award have on the organisations involved?
Explain:
- what advantages public funding would offer your project, for example: appeal to investors, more partners, reduced risk or a faster route to market
- the likely impact of the project outcomes on the organisations involved
- what other routes of investment or means of support you have already engaged with and why they were not suitable
- how any existing or potential investment or support will be used in conjunction with the grant funding
- what your project would look like without public funding
- how this project would change the R&D activities of all the organisations involved
Question 14. Costs and value for money
How much will the project cost and how does it represent value for money for the team and the taxpayer?
In terms of your project goals, explain:
- your total project costs
- the grant you are requesting from Innovate UK
- how each partner will finance their contributions to your project
- how this project represents value for money for you and the taxpayer
- how it compares to what you would spend your money on otherwise
- the balance of costs and grant across the project partners
- any subcontractor costs and why they are critical to your project
You must complete the project financial cost breakdown template provided to the Canadian partners in your consortium by National Research Council of Canada Industrial Research Assistance Program (NRC IRAP).
You must save the completed template as a PDF and upload as an appendix to this question.
All partners in the consortium must work together to complete the project financials on the first page by entering a high-level summary of the full project cost breakdown in both national currencies.
For conversion rates, you must use the exchange rate for June as listed in the HMRC exchange rates for 2024: monthly.
3. Finances
Each organisation in your project must complete their own section in project costs.
UK organisations
UK organisations must list their project costs, organisation details and funding details in the application.
UK Academic institutions must complete and upload a Je-S form.
For full details on what costs you can claim see our project costs guidance. You can also view our Application Finances video.
4. Project Impact
This section is not scored but will provide background to your project.
Each partner must complete the Project Impact questions before being able to submit the application.
More information can be found in our Project Impact guidance and by viewing our Impact Management Framework video.
Background and further information
The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the importance of having resilient and innovative domestic life sciences sectors along with flexible and scalable biomanufacturing capacity. It also showcased a number of new and innovative platform technologies, including but not limited to, messenger RNA-based vaccines and therapies, and lipid nanoparticle delivery systems.
These technologies are important in the development and production of next generation biologics and advanced therapies, including cell and gene therapies, and tissue therapies. Canada and the UK have identified this as an area of collaborative priority.
The aim of this new Canada-UK partnering initiative is to further develop and diversify the biomanufacturing ecosystems in both countries. This will support organisations build the technical capabilities required for the development and economically sustainable production of these next-generation vaccines and therapies. This will ensure both countries will be well positioned to respond to future health emergencies.
This program will also help to address the shared biomanufacturing priorities of Canada and the UK. This will promote partnerships between small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) from each country and enhance connectivity across other relevant stakeholders including, academic and government research institutions and national biomanufacturing assets.
The support of a diverse portfolio of technologies and platforms is to build the desired flexibility and capabilities into the ecosystem that are relevant for both large-scale and more distributed or point of care bioproduction processes.
Data sharing
This competition is jointly operated by Innovate UK, and the National Research Council of Canada (NRC) (each an ‘agency’).
Any relevant information submitted and produced during the application process concerning your application can be shared by one agency with the other, for its individual storage, processing and use.
This means that any information given to or generated by Innovate UK in respect of your application may be passed on to NRC and vice versa. This would include, but is not restricted to:
- the information stated on the application, including the personal details of all applicants
- scoring and feedback on the application
- information received during the management and administration of the grant, such as Monitoring Officer reports and Independent Accountant Reports
Innovate UK and NRC are directly accountable to you for their holding and processing of your information, including any personal data and confidential information. Data is held in accordance with their own policies. Accordingly, Innovate UK, and NRC will be data controllers for personal data submitted during the application.
Innovate UK complies with the requirements of UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018, and is committed to upholding data protection legislation, and protecting your information in accordance with data protection principles.
The Information Commissioner’s Office also has a useful guide for organisations, which outlines the data protection principles.
Find a project partner
Innovate UK and NRC IRAP will hold a briefing and information session at 2pm UK time (which is 6am PDT and 9am EDT) on 16 May 2024.
Please visit the b2match networking platform and create an online profile. Participants' profiles will be visible to all who are interested in this collaboration opportunity.
If you want help to find a project partner, contact Innovate UK Business Connect.Support for SMEs from Innovate UK EDGE
If you receive an award, you will be contacted about working with an innovation and growth specialist at Innovate UK Business Growth. This service forms part of our funded offer to you.
These specialists focus on growing innovative businesses and ensuring that projects contribute to their growth. Working one-to-one, they can help you to identify your best strategy and harness world-class resources to grow and achieve scale.
We encourage you to engage with Innovate UK Business Growth, delivered by a knowledgeable and objective specialist near you.Assessment
Your application will be reviewed by three independent assessors based on the content of your application and their skills or expertise relevant to your project. All of the scores awarded will count towards the total score used to make the funding decision unless you are notified otherwise.
You can find out more about our assessment process in the General Guidance.
Your submitted application will be assessed against these criteria.
Briefing slides
Briefing slides are available to download here.
Next steps
If you are successful with this application, you will be asked to set up your project.
You must follow the unique link embedded in your email notification. This takes you to your Innovation Funding Service (IFS) Set Up portal, the tool that Innovate UK uses to gather necessary information before we can allow your project to begin.
You will need to provide:
- the name and contact details of your project manager and project finance lead
- for UK organisations, a redacted copy of your bank details
- a collaboration agreement
- an exploitation plan
For UK organisations, in order for us to process your claims, you must make sure you have a valid UK business bank account. It can take several weeks for a new account to be created if required. We recommend starting this process as early as possible to avoid any delays to your project start date.
The bank account which grant is to be paid into must:
- be a business account in the same name as the organisation listed in IFS
- be from a UK bank regulated by the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA)
- have a cheque and credit clearing facility
Online accounts are eligible as long as they meet the above criteria.
Innovate UK will accept most banking societies apart from:
- Viva Wallet
- Intesa Sanpaolo
- Equals Money UK Limited
If you have any doubts that your bank account will not meet Innovate UK's funding criteria, you can use the sort code checker. If you input the sort code and find a tick next to the ‘BACS Direct Credit payments can be sent to this sort code’, this will give you an indication that the bank account you hold is acceptable.
Finance checks
For UK organisations we will carry out checks to make sure you are an established company with access to the funds necessary to complete the project.
You must check your IFS portal regularly and respond to any requests we have sent for additional information to avoid any delays.
Failure to complete project setup may result in your grant offer being withdrawn.
Your Grant offer letter (GOL)
Once you have successfully completed project setup, we will issue your GOL.
The GOL will be made available on your IFS portal. You will need to sign and upload this for us to approve. Once approved we will send you an email with permission to start your project on your confirmed start date.
You must not start your project before the date stated on your email and GOL. Any costs incurred before your agreed start date cannot be claimed as part of your grant.
If your GOL is approved on or before the fifteenth of the month it will be dated from the first of that month. If your GOL is approved after the fifteenth, it will be dated the first of the next month.If your application is unsuccessful
If you are unsuccessful with your application this time, you can view feedback from the assessors. This will be available to you on your IFS portal following notification.
Sometimes your application will have scored well, and you will receive positive comments from the assessors. You may be unsuccessful as your average score was not above the funding threshold or your project has not been selected under the portfolio approach if this is applied for this competition.Contact us
If you need more information about how to apply on the Innovation Funding Service platform or you want to submit your application in Welsh, email support@iuk.ukri.org or call +44 (0)300 321 4357.
Our phone lines are open from 9am to 12pm and 2pm to 5pm UK time, Monday to Friday (excluding bank holidays).
Innovate UK or any of our partners will not tolerate abusive language in any written or verbal correspondence, applications, social media or any other form that might affect staff.
Canada
Canadian applicants can also contact the National Research Council of Canada Industrial Research Assistance Program (NRC IRAP) International Office: IRAP.International.PARI@nrc-cnrc.gc.ca.
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