Tagged / innovation

Prof Sir Mark Walport outlines the vision and objectives for UK Research and Innovation

On Tuesday morning Professor Sir Mark Walport, Chief Designate of UK Research and Innovation, gave a speech outlining the vision, objectives and next steps in development for the organisation. The aim is for UKRI to be the best research and innovation agency in the world; a model which can be emulated by other countries.

You can watch the whole speech here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bJ8jJaBu-tA and access the slides here: UKRI vision speech slides. If you’re on Twitter you can follow tweets on this topic using #UKRIVision.

There was a significant focus on the importance to research of internationalisation and a global outlook. A new Rutherford Fund of £100m was announced (part of the already announced £4.7Bn to attract international researchers to the UK). The Rutherford Fund will be administered by the four national academies and UKRI. There will also be specific opportunities around the Global Challenges Research Fund (the focus is on tackling the UN Sustainable Development Goals), the Newton Fund and the Industrial Strategy Challenges Fund (a second wave of calls will be announced later in 2017).

On the whole it was predominantly a reassurance that the strengths of the existing system will continue, such as a commitment to the dual support system. Mark Walport spoke a lot about how UKRI’s approach will be built on the Haldane report and principle, particularly in terms of excellence and rigour, global outlook, the importance of experts, data and evidence, etc.

Interestingly, the innovation driver was spoken about in terms of having evolved from STEM to STEAM (science, technology, engineering, arts, maths). The arts element was illustrated via the importance of design in innovation, with an example given of the iPhone. This is a movement that is gaining momentum, particularly in the United States – read more here: http://stemtosteam.org/.

Four drivers for UKRI were confirmed as:

  1. Grand challenges linked to the world’s population and its impact on the Earth’s resources: in terms of population growth, ageing population, changing demographics, migration, climate change.
  2. Changing nature of research: as a result of increasing interdisciplinarity, big data, new tools and internationalisation.
  3. World of business and industry is changing: we are in the fourth industrial revolution with the fusion of physical, digital and biological science, a blurring of manufacturing and services, and the circular economy. Mention was made of the Government’s Industrial Strategy in driving this agenda.
  4. Society is changing: trust in the establishment and experts, the role of social media, globalisation, and “science meets public values” (benefits of public engagement).

Ingredients for the success of UKRI were noted as:

  • Diversity (possibly an early policy priority for UKRI?)
  • The importance of both fundamental and applied research
  • Brightest minds
  • Infrastructure roadmap
  • Collaboration
  • Engagement and partnership with stakeholders government, industry, etc.
  • Rigorous evaluation

There was mention towards the end of the speech about research intergrity and the importance of good conduct in research. UKRI will tackle issues of reproducibility of research findings, opennes, research communications and research careers (particularly diversity, incentives, etc.). When asked in the Q&A, Mark Walport reinforced the view that academics “should read the research rather than read the title of the paper or the journal in which it’s published”.

The UKRI vision was set out as:

 

 

Watch this space for further developments.

 

HEIF-6: funding now available for innovative KE projects

HEFCE provide Higher Education Innovation Funding (HEIF) to universities to facilitate a broad range of knowledge-based interactions between them and the wider world, which result in economic and social benefit to the UK. The current round of funding is referred to as HEIF-6 and runs from August 2017 to July 2022.

An internal call is now open for applications from BU colleagues who wish to develop innovative projects. Funding will be awarded to those applications that clearly demonstrate how new/existing collaborations will be developed and how societal/economic impact will be achieved. Interdisciplinary and/or cross-Faculty/PS proposals are encouraged, as are proposals with international collaborators.

We anticipate making awards of £10k-100k per project per year. Projects should be between one and three years in duration and must align to one of BU’s HEIF-6 themes:

  • Advanced manufacturing
  • Health (focusing on digital health and e-health)
  • Digital and creative

Colleagues wishing to apply should read BU’s HEIF-6 strategy and the HEIF-6 FAQs before completing the HEIF-6 application form. These documents can be found on the i-drive (I:\R&KEO\Public\HEIF 6). Applications must be supported by the Project Lead’s Faculty and signed by the relevant Deputy Dean (Research and Professional Practice). Any queries should be sent to Julie Northam (jnortham@bournemouth.ac.uk) in the first instance.

Completed applications should be sent to Rebecca Edwards (redwards@bournemouth.ac.uk) by midnight on Sunday 23rd July. We aim to confirm the outcomes within a fortnight of the closing date.

Innovative narrative concept now available across several platforms

FHSS’ Prof Lee-Ann Fenge & Dr. Kip Jones

FHSS’ Kip Jones and Lee-Ann Fenge are pleased to announce that their article , “Gift Stories How Do We Retell the Stories that Research Participants Give Us?” is now available across several platforms.  Along with the open-access version from Creative Approaches to Research now being available, it can be downloaded on Academia.edu and BRIAN.

Jones and Fenge comment: “We can no longer afford to ignore the great advances made in representation of qualitative data. These have been overwhelmingly demonstrated by the successes achieved in auto-ethnography, poetic enquiry, ethno-drama, film, Performative Social Science and/or other arts-based efforts in research and dissemination”.

Narrative methods contribute greatly to the advances made in qualitative research. A narrative style should also be promoted in publications and presentations. This study on older LGBT citizens in rural Britain highlights this by means of a report on one part of that study—a Focus Group.

Narrative researchers are natural storytellers and need to foreground this when reporting studies for publication. Qualitative research is always about story reporting and story making, and narrative research (listening to and retelling stories) is a key democratising factor in qualitative social science research.

Recent Writing from Kip Jones Available on the Internet

 

“Kyle’s photo-montage of black and white clippings, mostly from fashion magazines, Bailey and Avedon, etc., glued to the walls surrounding his bed”.

Kip Jones is pleased to announce that the tripartite story, “True confessions: why I left a traditional liberal arts college for the sins of the big city”, first published in Qualitative Research Journal, is available on Academia.edu.  Jones is particularly pleased that what is now called ‘auto-fiction’ has been accepted for publication by such a major qualitative journal. The three stories in the article conclude with a scene from Jones’ ongoing development of the feature film script for “Copacetica”. All three stories portray aspects of the sexual fumbling and romantic insecurities typical in youth.

“Dirty Frank’s” bar, Philadelphia, where the main characters of “Copacetica” frequently meet.

The second piece of writing consists of the bar scene from “Copacetica”. This is the scene in which all the major characters are introduced and the story sets up the conundrum that the main character will face in the film.

“Copacetica” tells the tale of a gullible youth on a roller coaster ride of loss of innocence and coming out in the flux and instability of 1960s hippy America. Often seen as a period of revolution in social norms, Copacetica’s themes include being different, the celebration of being an outsider, seeing oneself from outside of the “norm”, and the interior conflicts of “coming out” within a continuum as a (gay) male in a straight world. These observations are set within the flux and instability of a period of great social change, but which are often viewed in retrospect as consistent and definable. Being straight or being gay can also be viewed in a similar way within the wider culture’s need to set up a sexual binary and force sexual “choice” decision-making for the benefit of the majority culture, or ‘heteronormativity’.  Through the device of the fleeting moment, the story interrogates the certainties and uncertainties of the “norms” of modernity.

In the later gallery scene (not yet published), a minor character explains the meaning of the word, “copacetic”:

VISITOR TWO
What d’he say?

VISTOR ONE
“Everything’s copacetic”! (Beat) 
What does that mean, anyway?

VISITOR THREE
Everything’s cool. Everything’s okay. 
Or “Groovy” as they like to say.

Asked what he enjoyed about writing the script for this film, Jones said, “Definitely revisiting the slang used by youth of the 1960s! It’s virtually its own language. And writing the sex scenes. Exciting and very tiring. Almost like the real thing”.

You can read the opening scene planned for the film on KIPWORLD: “Copacetica” Scene 1. EXT SUBURBAN HOUSE POOL NIGHT

Chancellor announces first round of Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund funding in Spring Budget

money and cogs

The first tranche of challenges supported by the Industrial Strategy Challenge fund (ISCF) has been welcomed by research and innovation leaders. The spring budget announced an initial investment of £270 million in 2017 to 2018. This is to kick-start the development of disruptive technologies that have the potential to transform the UK economy.

First announced by the Prime Minister at the 2016 CBI Annual Conference, the ISCF will help identify and develop UK industries that are fit for the future, driving progress in technologies where the UK can build on our existing areas of industrial and research strength.

In his Budget speech  earlier this week, the Chancellor of the Exchequer Philip Hammond announced funding for the first three competitions in the ISCF:

  • Leading the world in the development, design and manufacture of batteries that will power the next generation of electric vehicles, helping to tackle air pollution
  • Developing cutting-edge artificial intelligence and robotics systems that will operate in extreme and hazardous environments, including off-shore energy, nuclear energy, space and deep mining
  • Accelerating patient access to new drugs and treatments through developing brand new medicine manufacturing technologies, helping to improve public health

Read in full.

 

Funding opportunities: Design foundations

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Are you working with a business ? have business connections that would be interested in this funding? This call is now live.

UK businesses can apply for a share of up to £1 million for early-stage design projects working on identifying opportunities and generating ideas.

Innovate UK is to invest up to £1 million in early-stage design projects to help businesses identify high-value innovation opportunities and generate ideas. These should be for new products, services or business models that align with customer demand.

Proposals should use design-led methods from first principles to understand customer motivations and behaviour, inspire new ideas, support decision-making and inform strategy.

Projects are likley to  to range in size from total costs of £20,000 to £100,000. Projects should last between 3 and 9 months.

A single UK business must lead the project:

  • applications must be business led. Only individual UK based businesses are eligible to apply
  • up to a maximum of 70% of the total eligible project costs can be allocated for the sub-contracting of design services to one or more other UK registered businesses

For more information click on the relevant links below:

Background to this call – previous blog post

Competiton brief

Competition guidance

What is the nature of the innovation required from education for our mobile and connected society?

innovation---useFirst in the ‘Leading Innovation’ series of seminars, Professor John Traxler, Professor of Digital Learning at the University of Wolverhampton, will visit BU on Tuesday 24 January to present ‘What is the nature of the innovation required from education for our mobile and connected society?’.

Professor Traxler will be looking at questions such as; why do we need to be innovative? What are the benefits of innovation to me, my department, Faculty and the wider organisation of BU? And How can we nurture and support innovation as leaders? The session will take place on Talbot Campus, starting at 2.30pm and finishing at 4pm.

The ‘Leading Innovation’ series is based on the presenters’ own experiences, case studies, ideas and thoughts and by sharing their approach, techniques and other interesting facts, covering Innovation in Research, Innovation in Education and Innovation in Professional Practice. A number of sessions are scheduled to run between January and May 2017 and will be presented by colleagues from across BU as well as guest speakers, which include Peter Bryant, Head of Learning Technology and Innovation at the London School of Economics and Political Science, and Sarah Knight, Senior Co-design Manager at Jisc.

For further details of the sessions, and to book to attend, please visit the Staff Development & Engagement Staff Intranet pages.

 

Digital Agenda Impact Awards

award

The Digital Agenda Impact Awards, celebrating innovations that make a positive impact on the way the UK lives, learns and does business, are open for entries. The awards, sponsored by Nominet Trust, take place at London’s Barbican Centre on Thursday March 2, 2017.

The Impact Awards are open to any business, government or non-profit using digital products or services to make the world a better place. The awards are free to enter and open until January 20 2017.

There are 12 award categories under three broad headings – people, places and business.

People

  • Education
  • Employment and skills
  • Health
  • Money

Places

  • Cities
  • Climate
  • Food
  • Smart

Business

  • Business transformation
  • Sharing and partnership
  • Social and economic transformation

Click here for more information and to apply.

 

 

Innovation in research and university spin outs

Date: Tuesday 17th JanuaryTime: 13:00 – 16:00Location: EB708, Executive Business Centre, Lansdowne Campus, BH8 8EB

Register: https://enterpriseafternoon.eventbrite.co.uk

This session is an opportunity to discuss innovation in research and university spin outs. Visiting Professor Tom Kenny will provide some background to university spin outs and startups – what are they? And how do they happen?. Tom is also CEO of Spoonful of Sugar. There will be examples from BU academics and an opportunity to discuss knowledge exchange at BU. We will also hear from Andy Burroughs, Commercial Director at Wessex Academic Health Science Network (AHSN) about innovation in Dorset and whether we can get med tech to patients faster.

Programme:

13:00 – 14:00: Healthcare businesses/ university spin outs and start-ups; what is it all about? – Tom Kenny, Visiting Professor and CEO of Spoonful of Sugar

14:00 – 15:00: Examples of spin outs and start-ups – Professors Alison McConnell & Tamas Hickish

15:00 – 15:30: Jayne Codling and Rachel Clarke – KTPs, Student Project Bank, Innovation funding – to include HEIF and Innovate UK, Business connections and networking

15:30 – 16:00: Can we get med tech to patients faster? – Andy Burroughs, Commercial Director, Wessex AHSN

16:00 – 16:30: Panel Q&A

Innovate UK launch open funding programme

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Are you working with a business that would be interested in this funding opportunity? Research organisations can participate as project collaborators. (The level of total research participation is set at a maximum of 30% of total eligible project costs.)

UK businesses can apply for a share of up to £15 million to deliver transformational innovations with potential for impact on the UK economy.

The competition is now live and open to the best business-led, innovative or disruptive ideas or concepts. These can be drawn from any technology, engineering or industrial area. This area can be one that fits into, or be outside of, any one or more of Innovate UK’s 4 priority sectors for growth. (Emerging and Enabling Technologies, Health and Life Sciences, Infrastructure Systems, Manufacturing and Materials.)

To be in scope, a proposal must:

  • demonstrate transformational or disruptive innovation leading to novel, new products, processes or services
  • articulate a clear, anticipated growth and commercialisation impact for the business(es) with considerable, demonstrable (as you would set out in a pitch to any serious investor) potential to lead to a significant return on investment (ROI)

Priority will be given to proposals that are likely to lead to sustainable gains in productivity and/or access to new overseas markets through export-led business growth.

To lead a project you must:

  • be a UK-based business
  • be a business of any size
  • carry out your project in the UK
  • work alone or in collaboration with others (businesses, research base and third sector) – this could be BU

For more information click here for:

or more information on knowledge exchange at BU contact Jayne Codling within RKEO.

 

Health Innovation Programme – February 2017

innovation_591

This 3 day course is aimed at innovators and entrepreneurs who are looking to start or expand a healthcare related business.

Dates: 9, 10 & 14 February 2017

Location: University of Southamption Science Park

Deadline for applications:  31 January 2017*  – places will be filled on a first come first serve basis

For more information: click here

To apply: click here

SHIVA project progresses with innovation funding

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The SHIVA Project has received Higher Education Innovation Funding (HEIF) that runs for 12 months from August 2016 until July 2017. (HEIF 5+1+1.)

The HEIF funding will be critical in terms of supporting the development of networks locally, nationally and beyond. The key aims will be to link user groups and stakeholders in education, health and wellbeing related to children, young people and adults, through the creative digital innovations offered by the SHIVA project.

This project which brought innovative virtual sculpting tools to children with complex disabilities, enabling them to partake in creative digital activities from which they had previously been excluded was recognised in the Time Higher Awards last November winning the Outstanding Digital Innovation in Teaching or Research Category.

Originally the SHIVA project on 3D modelling and 3D printing for young people with disabilities was funded by the EU Interreg programme with the duration from 2010 to 2015.

The original project team worked with the Victoria Education Centre (VEC) in Poole.  As the project ended in 2015, it was clear there was scope to take this project beyond the initial funding and the SHIVA project has successfully been awarded impact acceleration funding and more recently HEIF funding.

A new Research Assistant, Michelle Wu, an NCCA graduate (2016), is the latest member to join this team. Michelle will be involved in turning the SHIVA system into a deployable product with proper installation, configuration and usage instructions. This area of work will help make SHIVA accessible to all potential users in the UK and further afield and strengthen the potential for developing networks that will benefit from this award winning technology.

For more information on this project contact Alexander Pasko or Oleg Fryazinov within the Faculty of Media and Communication.

Jayne Codling within RKEO co-ordinates the HEIF project portfolio for BU. Feel free to contact Jayne if you have any questions regarding HEIF at BU or knowledge exchange activities including business engagement and innovation funding.

Business collaboration & networking

gamechanger

Need help with networking? – why not book onto the business engagement and networking session on 2 November for some hints and tips that you can put into practice.

Date: Wednesday 16 November

Location: The Fusion Building, Bournemouth University

Event information:

Building on the successful Game Changer event held earlier in the year, Bournemouth University and NHS Dorset Clinical Commissioning Group present The Game Changer Reloaded – promoting innovation and fostering collaboration across Dorset. Join Richard Dolan, Dr Phil Richardson and Professor Jim Roach and a diverse collection of speakers to learn more about the art of the possible and the power of innovation to transform health services within the region.

Places are going fast for both sessions so make sure you book your space. Academics are encouraged to attend both sessions but if you are looking for potential funding partners / research collaborators session 2 is a must.

It’s free: book now for sessions 1 and/or 2

Timings:

Session 1 – 9.00 am -3.00 pm: Speakers from BU and external organisations share their innovation journeys throughout the day providing inspiration and ideas to those attending as to how to get involved.

Session 2 – 3.15 pm  – 4.15 pm: Facilitation and networking: This session offers the opportunity to share ideas and develop future collaborations. There’s also the chance to begin to consider research ideas that could subsequently be progressed in order to obtain external funding in the future.

Each session will need to be booked separately.

Throughout the day there’s a pop-up innovation exhibition for guests to enjoy and to share and refine ideas.

It’s free: book now for The Game Changer Reloaded 

This event forms a number being run at the university as part of the Festival of Enterprise.

Need help with networking? – why not book onto the business engagement and networking session on 2 November.

Innovation awards

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SME innovation awards (2016) – small business were honoured on Tuesday evening at  an awards ceremony at the Houses of Parliament.

The awards recognise the many innovative successful projects that Innovate UK has co-funded. They celebrate the projects and companies that show the impact of innovation on business growth and the economy.

There were 5 categories – 4 specific and 1 overall award for inspirational innovation. Could we consider research and collaboration at BU for such an award? KTP’s also form part of this funding and contributed to Mech Tool Engineering Ltd, Gaist Solutions Limited and University of York and Phasefocus being shortlised.

Read the blog post in full including the winners and organisations shortlisted and how their areas of innovation became award winning.

Live funding competitions.

How to apply for funding.

Case studies.