R&D Funding Opportunities

In Spring 2022, the UK government announced its largest ever investment in R&D for the period 2022-2025 of £39.8bn.

The majority of funding is being delivered through the Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) and its partner organisations. The budget allocations will allow the government to deliver on the ambitions set out in its Innovation Strategy.

What does it mean for my organisation?

R&D grant funding helps to de-risk the innovation process. Accessing public funds allows organisations to create new and innovative products, processes and services with less investment of their own required.

This significant Government investment in innovation means there are numerous R&D funding opportunities available for academia, small, medium and large businesses across a wide range of sectors. However, navigating this funding landscape can be time consuming and complex.

As part of our commitment to help support and commercialise innovation, FIS360 is minimising the effort you need to find the funding you require by signposting you to the most up to date information on public sector R&D funding. We are also offering to send funding alerts to those organisations who wish to be kept up to date on new funding opportunities.

Where to look?

There is no ‘one-stop-shop’ that tells you about all of the available funding sources, however, there are a number of useful sites that between them, signpost you to the vast majority of the available public sector R&D funding opportunities:

The Knowledge Transfer Networks (KTN) Funding Opportunities page covers most UK public sector funding, EU opportunities and also private sector challenges available through their own Innovation Exchange programme.

The UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) Funding Finder covers all of the funding competitions run by UKRI including all of the Research Councils.

The Innovate UK Innovation Funding Service (IFS) covers all funding competitions (grants, loans and R&D contracts) run by Innovate UK both on their own behalf and on behalf of other Government Departments.

For Ministry of Defence (MoD) funded opportunities related to the Defence and Security sectors and technology transfer, the Defence and Security Accelerator (DASA) website provides information of open innovation competitions, innovation focus areas and themed competitions.

Game Changers is managed by FIS360. in partnership with NNL and funds feasibility and proof of concept projects that address challenges set by the nuclear sector. It also provides invaluable access to the end users

The Net Zero Technology Centre, is a public/private partnership based in Aberdeen. It funds R&D challenges to drive investment in net zero-related technologies. Its funding opportunities can be found here.

NB. Whilst the above sites capture the significant majority of the Governments announced.

R&D. funding, we recognise that other funding opportunities may exist.

Opportunities

Here are some of the most recent public sector R&D funding opportunities:

Gov.uk Funding

Innovate UK Smart Grants: July 2022

Key features:

UK registered organisations can apply for a share of up to £25 million for game-changing and commercially viable R&D innovation that can significantly impact the UK economy. This funding is from Innovate UK, part of UK Research and Innovation.

This competition is open to single applicants and collaborations.

Opening date: 28th July 2022

Closing date: 26th October 2022

Apply here
Gov.uk Funding

Women in Innovation Awards 2022/23

Key features:

Women with exciting, innovative ideas who will inspire others can apply for an award which includes a £50,000 grant and bespoke business support.

This competition is open to single applicants only.

To lead a project you must be a woman founder, co-founder or senior decision maker within a UK registered micro or SME business that has been operating for at least one year by the competition closing date.

Opening date: 22nd August 2022

Closing date: 19th October 2022

Apply here
Gov.uk Funding

Community Research Networks – Expression of interest

Key features:

Organisations can apply for a share of £500,000 to support proposals to form a Community Research Network in their area. This is an expression of interest competition.

This competition is open to collaborations only.

Opening date: 25th July 2022

Closing date: 14th September 2022

Apply here
Gov.uk Funding

UK Privacy Enhancing Technologies Challenge Prize

Key features:

UK registered organisations can apply for a share of up to £700,000 to develop innovative privacy solutions to two real world challenge use cases.

This competition is open to single applicants only.

Opening date: 20th July 2022

Closing date: 19th September 2022

Apply here
Gov.uk Funding

Innovation Loans Future Economy Competition – Round 5

Key features:

UK registered businesses can apply for loans for innovative projects with strong commercial potential to significantly improve the UK economy.

This competition is open to single SME applicants registered in the UK.

Opening date: 20th July 2022

Closing date: 14th September 2022

Apply here
Gov.uk Funding

Knowledge transfer partnerships (KTP): 2022 to 2023 Round 3

Key features:

UK registered academic institutions, RTOs or Catapults can apply for a share of up to £9 million to fund innovation projects with businesses or not for profit organisations.

Opening date: 27th June 2022

Closing date: 14th September 2022

Apply here
Gov.uk Funding

DASA: Open Call for Innovation - Cycle 3 Security Rapid Impact, Defence Rapid Impact and all Innovation Focus Areas

Key features:

The Open Call is one of the funding competition mechanisms DASA uses to find proposals that address challenges faced by government stakeholders. It gives bidders the opportunity to present their ideas to defence and security stakeholders at any time, without waiting for a relevant Themed Competition.

Closing date: 20th September 2022

Apply here
Gov.uk Funding

DASA Competition: Defence Innovation Loans

Key features:

Loans of up to £1.6m with a below market interest rate of 7.4% per annum to help convert mature defence innovation into a strong business proposition for defence procurement.
Open indefinitely
Apply here

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