Innovation, Research and Development

A new £16 million funding programme has been launched to boost small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) defence innovation in the UK. The programme aims to keep the UK at the forefront of defence technology, improving the capabilities available to armed forces, and providing some of these to the global market. Grants of up to 50% of a project’s value, up to a maximum of £500,000, will be made available for collaborative projects between SME...

The Scottish Funding Council has announced that the Advanced Innovation Voucher Scheme is open for applications. The awards are aimed at building sustained relationships between small and medium-sized companies and universities or Further Education colleges in Scotland who may have previously collaborated together or for those companies who are beginning their collaborative journey with a HEI / FE college partner. Businesses in partnership wi...

As part of its strategy to diversify the 5G telecoms supply chain, the Department of Digital, Culture, Media and Sport is making up to £25 million in funding available to enable universities to work with telecoms firms to research and develop the next generation of 5G and 6G network equipment. The Future Open Networks Research Challenge will allocate funding for early-stage projects to develop commercially attractive open and interoperable te...

UK not-for-profit organisations and public bodies working in collaboration can apply for a share of £500,000 in funding to support proposals to form a Community Research Network in their area that will support local people to play a more active role in research and innovation. The aim of the UK Research and Innovation Community Research Networks Expression of Interest Competition is to provide grants of £25,000 to support up to twenty organi...

The Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy has launched a new £12 million funding round to support regulators and local authorities to develop initiatives that help businesses bring innovative products and services to market. The Regulators’ Pioneer Fund will award grants of up to £1 million for projects that encourage business innovation and investment, and help UK regulators keep pace with technological advances of the fut...

UK public sector organisations can apply for grants of up to £250,000 to help them to better exploit high-potential intangible assets such as intellectual property, data, innovation, software and knowhow. The funding is made available by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy through the Knowledge Assets Grant Fund 2022, which supports early-stage research into the identification and development of existing public sector...

UK registered organisations are invited to apply for a share of £2 million for early-stage innovation projects, that use people and planet-centred design processes and expertise to influence their future research and development activity. The competition will help businesses, charities, public sector and not-for-profit organisations work alone or in collaboration to develop new ideas or test and improve existing ideas that will benefit people...

Innovate UK will invest up to £2 million in early-stage innovation projects that use people and planet centred design processes and expertise. The aim of this competition is to help businesses develop new ideas that will deliver benefits for people and the planet, aligned with the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. These can be for new or significantly improved products, services, places or business models. Applications are encouraged from...

The Arts and Humanities Research Council has launched a call for proposals to develop creative research capability within UK research institutions in particular smaller specialist institutions to enhance their capacity to contribute to the UK’s creative and cultural economy. The grants can be used to renew, repurpose and upgrade research facilities and equipment. Three funding strands are available: grants of up to £1 million for equipment...

A new £4.1 million prize for innovations to help change the lives of people living with dementia will open to applications in the autumn. Innovators will be invited to develop technologies that learn about the lives and routines of people living with early-stage dementia, employing assistive technology and machine learning to adapt as their condition progresses, and thereby helping them remain independent in their homes. The Alzheimer’s Soc...

The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy has launched the second phase of the Industrial Energy Transformation Fund. The aim of the fund is to provide grant funding for feasibility and engineering studies, and for the deployment of industrial energy efficiency and deep decarbonisation projects. A total of £70 million is available for feasibility and engineering studies to enable companies to investigate identified energy...

Commercial organisations, appropriately qualified scientists or clinicians based in an accredited university or hospital in any country worldwide can now apply for funding for preclinical and clinical research. Projects should have the potential to advance knowledge that might lead to a cure for Parkinson’s disease. The Cure Parkinson’s Trust has a particular interest in projects that show the potential to delay, slow, stop reverse or prev...

Grants of up to £5,000 are available to individuals and organisations with ideas that will help make the chemical sciences more inclusive and diverse. The funding is being made available through the Royal Society of Chemistry’s Inclusion and Diversity Fund and will support innovative products, activities and research projects related to gender, disability, socio-economic background, language and the LGBT+ community. The Society will consid...

A new £400,000 green innovation fund is offering small to medium sized enterprises up to 60% funding towards projects worth up to £25,000 to help them deliver sustainable products, processes or services which aid the transition to a low carbon economy. The Eco-I North West Capital Grant Scheme will give businesses, charities, and social enterprises based in the North West of England the opportunity to collaborate with the regions leading uni...

Individuals or small groups or organisations in the UK who have a novel technical idea which they want to try out can apply for grants of between £250 and £3,000. The fund has been set up in memory of Peter Williams by his family. Peter spent his life generating a diversity of technical ideas and experimenting to see if they might work. Some of his ideas worked and some of them didn’t but they all left our world a better and more interest...

The UK Government has launched a competition to inspire the next generation of British space scientists and engineers. The competition will call on young people aged 16 or above to design a nanosatellite to support the UK’s decarbonisation drive. Entries are being welcomed from anyone in the UK, either individually or as part of a team, to compete for the £600,000 Challenge Fund which will enable the winners to develop and manufacture their...

Alzheimer’s Research UK is to relaunch a public engagement funding scheme to help tackle misconceptions around dementia and promote the importance of dementia research. The Inspire Fund will provide grants of up to £25,000 for innovative projects that engage the public with dementia and the progress being made in research into the condition. Networking opportunities will be an important feature of the application process, with the aim of cr...

Up to £22 million in funding is available for research into supply chain development for power electronics, electric machines and drives (PEMD) to support the UK’s drive towards net zero. The Innovation Funding Service, working with Innovate UK, part of UK Research and Innovation, will invest in business-led, supply chain focused, innovation projects that enable future improvements in productivity, capacity, quality and efficiency. UK regis...

Grants of between £250 and £5,000 are available to individuals and small groups or organisations based in the UK who have a novel technical idea which they want to try. Through the “I’ve Got an Idea” Fund, the Prospectory will provide funding to cover the costs of making and/or testing a novel technical idea, that would deliver a social or environmental benefit, and is intriguing, inventive and has an element of fun. The first award ma...