Category / Business Engagement

Innovate 2016 – The Global Spotlight on UK Innovation

Business Engagement, Funding opportunities, innovation, international, Knowledge Exchange, Knowledge Transfer

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Innovate 2016 will be held at Manchester Central on the 2nd – 3rd November 2016.

Take part in the global showcase of UK innovation, hear from global thought-leaders and create real business opportunities at Innovate 2016. Find out about today’s business opportunities and future-looking trends across manufacturing, health, cities of the future and technologies of the future.

Hear from industry-leaders on topics such as:

  • Retaining the edge with disruptive business models
  • Manufacturing: Tackling the productivity gap
  • Implementing resilience in a city of the future
  • Next-generation medicine: The UK as a world leader
  • Emerging technologies revolutionising innovation

View the full agenda.

Inspirational speakers
Hear from top-level inspirational speakers from organisations including:  Siemens, Versarien, Amazon, University of Manchester, Hyperloop One, High Value Manufacturing Catapult and of course Innovate UK CEO Dr Ruth McKernan CBE and Catherine Raines, CEO from the Department for International Trade.
Support zone

Discover the breadth of funding and support for businesses  and meet with the organisations that exist to help business thrive. The Support Zone will be back featuring among others the UK Business Angels Association, British Business Bank, HMRC and Growth Hubs.

Register and find out more.

 

How can augmented reality and virtual reality transform the retail journey?

Business Engagement, Funding opportunities, Knowledge Exchange

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Startups, innovative retailers and experts with an understanding of the retail landscape to get involved with  the  Visa Retail Pit Stop  This takes place on 6  – 7 October.

Attendees will get the opportunity to investigate how virtual reality and augmented reality, ambient data capture, mobile and sensor technologies can improve the customer experience. Register your interest before 13 September.

Submit your interest for the Visa Retail Pit Stop

Creative England Interactive Healthcare Fund

Business Engagement, Funding opportunities, innovation, Knowledge Exchange

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The South West Interactive Healthcare Programme  is currently seeking applications from the creative sector in addition to healthcare.

This £500,000 competition is funded by Creative England’s regional growth fund and run by South West and West of England Academic Health Science Networks (AHSNs) in conjunction with SETsquared.

The priorities themes for this competition are:

  • Enabling the health and care workforce, patients, their carers and families to work more effectively in care settings
  • Enabling patients and citizens to manage their health and wellbeing independently
  • Influencing and incentivising behaviour to improve health outcomes.

The funding is available to small or medium sized enterprises based in England (outside of Greater London) via investments of between £25,000 and £50,000. Funding will be allocated to support the uptake and market traction of innovative digital technologies that will clearly improve patient care and health service provision.

Applications will be assessed on a rolling basis and the final deadline for submissions is 30 September 2016. For the full guidelines and an application form, please visit the Creative England website.

Proximity to discovery – industry engagement fund

Business Engagement, Funding opportunities, innovation, Knowledge Exchange

andrew archery

Medical Research Council, GB

This enables a small number of research organisations to use creative approaches to building relationships with industry partners.

Short term people exchanges between industry and academia are seen as a key way of exchanging skills and knowledge and developing a longer term working relationship. Proximity to Discovery: Industry Engagement Fund can be used for people and knowledge exchange at the very earliest stage of a collaboration and may not necessarily be aligned to a specific project objective.

Funding for individual applications is not expected to exceed £250,000 and it should be spent within 18 months.

Closing date 15 November 2016.

Click here for further information

If you are interested in submitting to this call you must contact your  RKEO Funding Development Officer with adequate notice before the deadline.

For more funding opportunities that are most relevant to you, you can set up your own personalised alerts on Research Professional. If you need help setting these up, just ask your School’s/Faculty’s Funding Development Officer in  RKEO or view the recent blog post here.

If thinking of applying, why not add notification of your interest on Research Professional’s record of the bid so that BU colleagues can see your intention to bid and contact you to collaborate.

 

Knowledge Transfer Partnerships – Submission deadlines

Business Engagement, Funding opportunities, innovation, Knowledge Exchange, Knowledge Transfer

After this next KTP submission deadline on 7th September 2016, there is one further deadline in 2016 – 2nd November 2016.

Various aspects of the KTP submission and approval process have changed over the past few months and for a breakdown of what these changes are, please take a look here.

Future KTP submission deadlines for your planning are:

  • 18th January 2017
  • 8th March 2017

If you have any KTP ideas that you’d like support with, please contact Rachel Clarke, KE Adviser on 61347.

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UK Universities focus on delivery and spur economic growth

Business Engagement, innovation, international, Knowledge Exchange

Innovate 2011v4
Universities earn over £4bn working with the wider world,  through knowledge exchange between UK universities and the public, private and third sectors.   The annual Higher Education, Business and Community Interaction (HE-BCI) Survey is the most accurate picture of UK higher education institutions’ commercial relationships.
UK performance is world leading. Comparisons demonstrate that the return on investment from commercialisation of research (sale of equity) is higher in the UK than in the USA or Japan and engagement with industry (proportion of research income) is at similar levels either side of the Atlantic.

 

MOD establishes defence innovation initiative

Business Engagement, Funding opportunities, innovation, Knowledge Exchange

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The UK’s Ministry of Defence has set up a project intended to help government researchers collaborate better with colleagues in industry and academia and to transform how the armed forces deal with future challenges.

Defence secretary Michael Fallon announced on 12 August that the initiative would include an Innovation and Research Insights Unit to anticipate emerging trends in technology and analyse the implications for UK defence and security. The unit would “informing critical decisions to maintain our military advantage and protect the UK”, he said.

Catalyst fund: innovation in learning and teaching

Business Engagement, Funding opportunities, innovation, Knowledge Exchange, Knowledge Transfer

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The Higher Education Funding Council for England invites applications for its catalyst fund: innovation in learning and teaching. This supports small-scale projects to develop innovations in learning and teaching for university provision.

The council is particularly interested in proposals which:

•develop curriculum innovations from interdisciplinary research, interdisciplinary professional practice or both;

•respond to employer demands for advanced skills or knowledge;

•develop use of learner analytics for particular pedagogic purposes.

Click here for more information.

If you are interested in submitting to  this  call you must contact your  RKEO Funding Development Officer with adequate notice before the deadline.

For more funding opportunities that are most relevant to you, you can set up your own personalised alerts on Research Professional. If you need help setting these up, just ask your School’s/Faculty’s Funding Development Officer in  RKEO or view the recent blog post here.

If thinking of applying, why not add notification of your interest on Research Professional’s record of the bid so that BU colleagues can see your intention to bid and contact you to collaborate.

Prosperity partnerships – EPSRC, business and universities

Business Engagement, Funding opportunities, innovation, Knowledge Exchange

Technology in the hands

The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council invites applications for its prosperity partnerships – EPSRC, business and universities. These enable existing, strategic, research-based partnerships between businesses and universities to undertake the co-creation of a large-scale, technology readiness level one to three research programme.

Consortia may be formed of multiple businesses and universities, but an existing strategic relationship must be in place between the lead business and university partners. Applications must be led by a business partner, who may lead on only one bid but may be a contributor to other bids. Universities may be involved in more than one bid.

For more information including timescales click here.

If you are interested in submitting to this  call you must contact your  RKEO Funding Development Officer with adequate notice before the deadline.

For more funding opportunities that are most relevant to you, you can set up your own personalised alerts on Research Professional. If you need help setting these up, just ask your School’s/Faculty’s Funding Development Officer in  RKEO or view the recent blog post here.

If thinking of applying, why not add notification of your interest on Research Professional’s record of the bid so that BU colleagues can see your intention to bid and contact you to collaborate.

Research and Knowledge Exchange Development Framework: Working with Business Pathway

Business Engagement, HEIF, innovation, Knowledge Exchange, Knowledge Transfer

The Research and Knowledge Exchange (RKE) Framework: Working with Business pathway focuses on developing interactions with a business audience.  Please see previous blog posts in the Development Framework for information on the separate pathways.

The aim of the ‘Working with Business’ pathway is to develop your skills to connect with the business community including networking, identifying project funding – including Knowledge Transfer Partnerships (KTPs) and building project teams involving businesses.  Sessions have been planned with these key areas as a focus.

Further information on this pathway will appear on the OD website including booking links over the summer.  Updates on this pathway and the wider RKE Development Framework will appear on the BU research blog.

Technology in the hands

Small companies offered £1.2m to seek out global partners

Business Engagement, innovation, international, Knowledge Exchange

Global

 

Innovate UK has launched a fund to encourage small British firms to work with international businesses and to help them enter global markets.

UK businesses looking to create international business networks can apply for funding to enable commercial research and innovation partnerships. It will also help businesses explore ideas for future collaboration.

Innovate UK is funding this competition. It is open to small and medium enterprises (SMEs). The funding will enable SMEs to carry out short feasibility studies and spend time abroad. The competition will encourage UK firms to create long term partnerships with overseas companies. It will also help them gain a better understanding of collaborative opportunities.

Competition information

  • The competition opens on 5 August 2016
  • The deadline for registration is noon on 21 September 2016
  • The deadline for application is noon on 28 September 2016
  • A UK SME must lead the project
  • A UK SME can carry out the project on their own or work with other UK partners
  • Only UK SMEs will receive funding
  • Innovate UK will fund projects with eligible costs of up to £30,000
  • Businesses may receive funding of up to 70% of their total project costs
  • Projects should last up to 4 months

Click here for further information and how to apply.

Creative Industries – new 5 year strategy

Business Engagement, innovation, international, Knowledge Exchange

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The Creative Industries Council’s new 5 year strategy proclaims amazing news for the Creative Industries. With the sector growing at 8.9% a year (making it the second fastest growing sector), the UK’s Creative Industries is vital to the UK’s economy.

The 2016 strategy refresh is demanding but attainable, with a focus on driving economic value, through support for business growth, job growth, exports and inward investment.  The sector seeks to build on existing trade relationships and to unlock the potential of the sector in international markets with a primary focus on the USA and key territories in Europe, Asia and the Middle East.  Review the Nesta/Creative England report on the Geography of Creativity . This includes rich content about  regional opportunities.

The Geography of Creativity in the UK

Business Engagement, Knowledge Exchange

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In this report, in partnership with Creative England, NESTA have used the latest data and official definitions to map the creative industries in the UK. The  goal is to provide a data resource to demonstrate the economic significance of the creative industries across the country, and inform policies to strengthen them further.

Findings

  • The creative industries are becoming more important in local economies across the UK. Between 2007 and 2014 they became more important in local business population in 9 out of every 10 locations.
  • Identified 47 creative clusters across the UK. London and the South East are important components of the UK creative industries, but so are the North, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. These clusters grew their creative employment by 28% between 2007 and 2014
  • The UK’s geography of creativity isn’t only about ‘hip creative cities’,  clusters in creative conurbations across the country have also been identifed.
  • Creative communities in different parts of the country are working together across cluster and administrative boundaries. The geography of the UK creative industries is an interconnected system.

Policy recommendations

  • Support the development of clusters outside of London and the South East
  • Continue efforts to share the benefits of London’s status as a global creative industries hub across the UK
  • Local Enterprise Partnerships and universities should consider what more they can do to address the strengths and weaknesses within their particular area, such as an over reliance on large firms or growing links between graduate talent pools and creative clusters
  • Networks of UK creative industries should strive to maintain their global reach.

(This work contains statistical data from ONS which is Crown Copyright. The use of the ONS statistical data in this work does not imply the endorsement of the ONS in relation to the interpretation or analysis of the statistical data. This work uses research datasets which may not exactly reproduce National Statistics aggregates.)

Download the full report.

Events for innovators, entrepreneurs and investors

Business Engagement, Info Days, innovation, Knowledge Exchange

events

Innovate UK supports many events that bring together innovators, successful entrepreneurs and investors. At the events information and advice  is available highlighting the type of support and funding that is currently available. Find and more and register for upcoming events:

Venturefest Manchester – Bridgewater Hall, Manchester, M2 3WS
Date: 21 September 2016
View speaker line up
Find out more & register >>

Venturefest Wales – SSE SWALEC, Cardiff, CF11 9XR
Date: 28 September 2016
View the full programme
Find out more & register >>

Venturefest Scotland – Glasgow Science Centre, Glasgow, G51 1EA
Date: 1 September 2016
View the agenda
Find out more & register >>

New Scientist Live – ExCeL London, E16 1XL
Date: 22 – 25 September 2016
We will be attending the New Scientist Live event where our Chief Executive, Dr Ruth McKernan MBE, will be talking about Therapies of the Future on Friday 23rd September.
See what’s on
Find out more & register >>

Low Carbon Vehicle Event 2016 – Millbrook, Bedford, MK45 2JQ
Date: 14 – 15 September 2016
Our stand will showcase some of our many successful LCV projects and be an opportunity to meet the Innovate UK and KTN team.
View the Seminar Programme
Find out more & register >>

Innovate 2016  – Manchester Central
Date: 2 – 3 November 2016.
Innovate 2016 is  Innovate UK’s  flagship event showcasing the very best of innovation talent and global opportunities for businesses.
Find out more & register >>

Why not update  Innovate UK with your location so you can receive relevant communications including events in your area Update my location>>

 

Interactive documentary launched – Psychiatric Genetic Counselling Research Project

Business Engagement, HEIF, innovation, Knowledge Exchange

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Media and Journalism students Chelsea Nwasike and Grace Brewer have developed an interactive documentary to illustrate the project including the two recent workshops that are helping to transform approaches to psychiatric genetic counselling.

Genetic counsellors and researchers who attended the European and international workshops were interviewed and included in an interactive platform, along with videos from Dr Kevin McGhee and a ‘mental health jar’ demonstration video.

Dr Kevin McGhee explained: “By expanding healthcare professionals understanding of genetics and mental illness and providing a way for people around the world to view these discussions from the workshops, we want to raise awareness and encourage people to take better care of their mental health.

Funded by the Higher Education Innovation Fund (HEIF) find out more about this project on the BU Research Website.

 

Digital Economy – Emerging and Enabling Technologies Workshop

Business Engagement, Info Days, innovation, Knowledge Exchange

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As part of its strategy development for Emerging and Enabling Technologies, Innovate UK are in the process of re-thinking its strategy for the Creative Economy.

The strategy will show the opportunities for UK companies, the barriers to realising those opportunities and the intervention that Innovate UK and its partners will take to help UK companies to achieve success.

There are two worksops being run in London on 17 August.  In this workshop, Innovate UK will share its early, straw-man thoughts , see input, and together design a strategy which describes a future of working together to achieve complementarity, joined up working and great successes for UK innovation.

This workshop is necessary for Innovate UK to launch its strategy at Innovate 2016 on the 2 November.

To register click the links below:

Morning workshop

Afternoon workshop

New business and university collaboration platform

Business Engagement, innovation, Knowledge Exchange

NCUB-Logo-Large

konfer has been developed to faciliate easier access to the university sector for the business community, by collating a large amount of information all on one platform. UK universities are bursting with innovation  and  world-class academics who are keen to collaborate with industry, charities and the public sector.

konfer was created by the National Centre for Universities and Business (NCUB) to make this astonishing wealth of expertise and resources more accessible. Working in partnership with the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) and Research Councils UK (RCUK), konfer brings knowledge and growth to businesses, valuable exposure for university talent, and future prosperity for the UK.

 

When a business owner spots an opportunity, konfer supports the journey from finding a research partner and funding to planning and co-creation. It does this by giving direct access to:

  • 8000 academics
  • 11,000 facility and equipment listings
  • 800,000 web pages from university sites and social media
  • 22,000 YouTube videos from university channels
  • 10,000 news, funding and events articles from curated feeds
  • 50,000 publicly funded research projects

konfer brings knowledge and growth to businesses, valuable exposure for university talent, and future strength for the UK economy.

Learn more

 

NCUB want  konfer to be as useful as possible, so  access to the  Alpha version of the site is available. No need for passwords or user names – just dive straight in. https://konfer.online

This means things may be a little rough around the edges and there may be some bugs to be  squished ! But,  hope  by sharing the site early,  hope to consider suggestions fro improvements. Planned live date is erly in the New Year.  Feedback can be emailed  konfer@ncub.co.uk . For more information on this platform and NCUB in general contact Jayne Codling within RKEO.

DfT Transport Technology Research Innovation Grants now open

Business Engagement, Funding opportunities, innovation, Knowledge Exchange

transport

The Department for Transport (DfT) opened on  Monday (25 July)  the latest round of its Transport Technology Research Innovation Grant (T-TRIG) to support technology innovation in the transport sector.

The grant offers 100% funding for projects in three separate calls:

  • An open call for new transport ideas
  • A targeted call for solutions to challenges in aviation security
  • A targeted call for Intelligent Transport Systems

T-TRIG provides seed funding to early-stage science, engineering or technology innovations that have potential for advancing the UK transport system.

The funding scheme is open to anyone, typically micro, small and medium-sized businesses or academia, to support research projects that could lead to the development of successful new transport products, processes or services.

KTN is supporting these calls, including a series of webinars, led by DfT officials that will provide details of the opportunities, answer questions and help guide potential applicants on how best to present their ideas.

Successful applicants will be awarded fully-funded grants of up to £25,000 for the open call. For the targeted calls, there’s a budget of £150,000 to fund three to six projects in Intelligent Transport Systems targeted call and £300,000 for the Aviation projects.

On the other hand, are you buying or selling an aviation company? You can then even find aviation businesses that are for sale, there are several pages online that list them like https://trufortebusinessgroup.com/aviation-businesses-for-sale/ so have a look.

Schedule of the Competitions

This next round of T-TRIG will be launched on Monday 25 July 2016.

The entry deadline for all three calls will be Monday 22 August, with projects running between 19 September 2016 and 9 January 2017.

Webinars this week for direct access to Department for Transport

To find out the full details of these grants and for the opportunity to ask questions to DfT officials, please register for one or more of the following webinars:

The schedule for these competitions requires a relatively short time to prepare applications, so early registration and preparation of questions is recommended.

For further details see the Department for Transport’s Competition page Transport-Technology Research Innovation Grant (T-TRIG)

If you are interested in submitting to any of the above calls you must contact your  RKEO Funding Development Officer with adequate notice before the deadline.

For more funding opportunities that are most relevant to you, you can set up your own personalised alerts on Research Professional. If you need help setting these up, just ask your School’s/Faculty’s Funding Development Officer in  RKEO or view the recent blog post here.

If thinking of applying, why not add notification of your interest on Research Professional’s record of the bid so that BU colleagues can see your intention to bid and contact you to collaborate.