Contracts for Innovation: Scaling community initiatives in diet and exercise

Who can apply

Your project

Projects must:

• start by 1 September 2025

• end by 31 August 2026

• last up to 12 months

• have total costs of between £200,000 and £250,000, inclusive of VAT

• spend 80% of awarded funding by 31 March 2026

Projects must always start on the first of the month, even if this is a non-working day. You must not start your project until your Contract has been approved by Innovate UK.

You must only include eligible project costs in your application. See our overview of eligible project costs. For specific guidance, see the eligibility section in this competition.

Applicant

To lead a project, you can:

• be an organisation of any size

• work alone or with the subcontracted skills and expertise of others from business, research organisations, research and technology organisations, or the third sector (charities, social enterprises and voluntary groups)

As an organisation you must:

• be a social enterprise and exist to provide benefits for society

• have a stated commitment to social outcomes and identified beneficiaries related to your social mission

• have objects in your constitutional documents that protect your social mission

• have a policy to distribute a portion of profits after tax, or be open to including one, so any surpluses are used to achieve positive social impacts in the long term

Contracts will be awarded to a single legal entity only. The majority of the project work and key deliverables must be completed by the applicant and be carried out in the UK. Subcontractors can be used, but only for specialist skills.

Sanctions

This competition will not fund you, or provide any financial benefit to any individual or entities directly or indirectly involved with you, which would expose Innovate UK or any direct or indirect beneficiary of funding from Innovate UK to UK Sanctions. For example, through any procurement, commercial, business development or supply chain activity with any entity as lead, partner or subcontractor related to these countries, administrations and terrorist groups.

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.

Funding

A total of up to £1.8 million inclusive of VAT, is allocated to this competition.

Contracts will be up to £250,000, inclusive of VAT, for each project for up to 12 months. We expect to fund up to six projects.

The total funding available for the competition can change. The funders have the right to apply a portfolio approach.

The contract is completed at the end of the competition and the successful organisation is expected to pursue commercialisation of their solution.

Value Added Tax (VAT)

You must select whether you are VAT registered before entering your eligible project costs.

VAT is the responsibility of the invoicing business. We will not provide any further advice and suggest you seek independent advice from HMRC.

VAT registered

If you select you are VAT registered, you must enter your eligible project costs exclusive of VAT. As part of the application process VAT will be automatically calculated and added to your project cost total. Your total eligible project costs inclusive of VAT must not exceed £250,000.

Not VAT registered

If you select you are not VAT registered, you must enter your eligible project costs exclusive of VAT and no VAT will be added. You will not be able to increase total project costs to cover VAT later should you become VAT registered. Your total project costs must not exceed £250,000.

Research and development (R&D)

Your application must have at least 50% of the contract value attributed directly and exclusively to R&D services, including solution exploration and design. R&D can also include prototyping and field-testing the product or service. This lets you incorporate the results of your exploration and design and demonstrate that you can produce in quantity to acceptable quality standards.

R&D does not include:

• commercial development activities such as quantity production

• supply to establish commercial viability or to recover R&D costs

• integration, customisation or incremental adaptations and improvements to existing products or processes

Innovate UK may revoke our decision to provide funding without notice if government commitment for this initiative is withdrawn.

Subsidy control

Contracts for Innovation competitions involve procurement of R&D services at a fair market value and are not subject to subsidy control criteria that typically apply to grant funding.

Your project

The aim of the competition is to fund social enterprises with the ability to scale and deliver social impact. Your proposal must address the delivery of community based diet and (or) exercise initiatives and your existing innovation must require further testing and R&D.

In this phase 3 competition you must further develop your existing pre-commercial innovation, deploying, testing and iterating in a real world or representative environment. You must work closely with potential users and customers, conducting the R&D to progress your project toward commercialisation.

In this competition you must:

• address one of the three themes

• identify a clear route to market, scalability and sustainability for your product or service

• have a validated business plan to scale your product or service and plan to scale by at least 25% of current baseline

• spend 80% of your allocated funding by 31 March 2026

• provide evidence of an existing lead customer who is using your product or service and the plan to increase their uptake

• detail a minimum of one and up to four new customers and an implementation plan for each

• describe how scaling your innovation addresses critical social challenges

• demonstrate a causal link between your business activities and achievement of your declared social impact

• describe how all social impact will be measured, evidenced, and reported

• outline your commitment to specific social outcomes, clearly identifying beneficiaries related to your social mission

• explain how any profits after tax will be distributed so any surpluses are used to achieve positive future social impacts

• describe how ongoing collaborations between all members of the project team will develop

• have the required ethical approvals, data sharing agreements and contracts in place

You must demonstrate a credible and practical route to market, so your application must include a plan to commercialise your results.

This is a single phase competition.

Specific themes

Your project can focus on one of the following community based initiatives for:

• diet

• exercise

• combined diet and exercise

Research categories

Phase 3: Adoption and scaling

This means planned research or critical investigation to gain new knowledge and skills for scaling up existing products, processes or services. The primary objective is to make further technical improvements on products, processes or services that are not substantially set.

You must work closely with the stakeholders to deliver the adoption and scaling up of the products processes or services in environments representative of real life operating conditions.

Projects we will not fund

We will not fund projects that:

• are not original in scope and duplicates someone else’s work

• do not have an existing lead customer

• do not have at least one additional new customer engaged

• do not plan to scale by at least 25% of your existing baseline of product, process or service

• do not demonstrate spending 80% of their requested funding by 31 March 2026

• do not have a strong social impact, focus or purpose

• do not address one of the three themes

• include clinical trials, clinical studies, or fundamental research

• require regulatory approval

• do not further develop or undertake R&D of existing innovations

• do not involve the development of an innovation element to enhance impact

• do not involve the commercial viability of an existing service following an initial pilot

23 May 2025

Online briefing event: join at 11am

Briefing slides will be available to download from supporting information after the event.

21 July 2025

Interviews start

22 July 2025

Interviews end

25 July 2025

Applicants notified

25 July 2025

Feedback

15 August 2025

Contracts awarded

1 September 2025

Project start from

Before you start

By submitting an application, you agree to the terms of the draft contract which is available once you start your application. The terms of the contract are non-negotiable and are included in the draft contract. We reserve the right to change the terms and conditions if necessary.

The final contract will include any milestones you have agreed with the funding authority and will be sent to you if your application is successful. The contract is binding once it is returned by you and signed by both parties.

When you start an application, you will be prompted to create an account as the lead applicant or sign in as a representative of your organisation. Using your account, you will be able to track your application’s progress.

As the applicant you are responsible for:

• collecting the information for your application

• representing your organisation in leading the project if your application is successful

You will be able to invite colleagues from your organisation to contribute to the application.

What happens next

A selected panel of assessors will review and score your application. You will be notified of the outcome and feedback will be provided. Contracts for this competition will then be issued to all successful applicants.

If your application passes the first stage of assessment you may be invited to attend an interview, where you must give a presentation. Your interview will take place either online or at a designated location. The date and time of your interview will be included in your invitation.

What we will ask you

The application is split into four sections:

1. Project details.

2. Application questions.

3. Finances.

4. Project Impact.

You must read the guidance on applying for a competition on the Innovation Funding Service before you start.

Before submitting, it is the 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

You can reopen your application once submitted, up until the competition deadline. You must resubmit the application before the competition deadline.

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 details

Give your project’s title, start date and duration.

Who made you aware of the competition?

Select a category to state who made you aware of the competition. You cannot choose more than one.

How long has your organisation been established for?

Select a category to state how long has your organisation been established for. You cannot choose more than one.

What is your organisation’s primary focus area?

Select a category to state your organisation’s primary focus area. You cannot choose more than one.

Project and scope summary

Provide a short summary of your project.

Describe your project briefly. Be clear about what makes it innovative and how it relates to the scope of the competition. How does it tackle different aspects of the challenge and how will it provide an integrated solution?

Give details of the lead organisation. Before you submit, we expect you to have discussed your application within your organisation.

Your answer for this section can be up to 800 words long.

This section is not scored, but we will use it to decide whether the project fits the scope of the competition. If it does not, it may be rejected.

Public description

Provide a brief description of your project. If your application is successful, we will publish this description. This can happen before you start your project. This question is mandatory, but we will not assess this content as part of your application.

Describe your project in a way that you are happy to see published. Do not include any commercially sensitive information. We have the right to amend the description before publication if necessary but will consult you about any changes.

Your answer can be up to 400 words long.

Applicant location

You must state the name of your organisation along with your full registered address.

You must also state the name and full registered address of any potential or confirmed subcontractors.

We are collecting this information to understand the geographical location of all participants of a project.

Your answer can be up to 400 words long.

2. Application questions

The assessors will score all of your questions except questions 1 to 5, which are not scored. You will receive feedback for each scored question. Find out more about how our assessors assess and how we select applications for funding.

Your answer to each question can be up to 400 words long. Do not include any URLs in your answers unless we have explicitly requested a link to a video. If you do, your application will be made ineligible.

Question 1. Themes (not scored)

Select one main theme from the following:

• diet

• exercise

• combined diet and exercise

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 which 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. International collaboration (not scored)

Does your proposed work involve any international collaboration or engagement?

You must provide details of any expected international collaboration or engagement.

You must include a list of the names and the countries, any international project co-leads, project partners, visiting researchers, or other collaborators are based in.

You must also include details of any subcontractors or service providers.

If your proposed work does not involve international collaboration or engagement, your answer must confirm this.

Question 5. Trusted Research and Innovation (not scored)

You must explain if your proposed project work relates to UKRI’s Trusted Research and Innovation (TR&I) Principles, including:

• a list of any dual-use (both military and non-military) applications to your research

• a list of the areas where your project is relevant to one or more of the 17 areas of the UK National Security and Investment (NSI) Act

• whether an export control license is required for this project under the academic export control guidance and the status of any applications

• a list of any items or substances on the UK Strategic Export Control List

If your proposed work does not relate to UKRI’s TR&I Principles, your answer must confirm this.

We may ask you to provide additional TR&I information at a later date, in line with UKRI TR&I Principles and funding terms and conditions.

Question 6. Proposed idea or technology

How does the project meet the challenge described in the competition scope?

Provide a description of your proposed idea or technology.

Why is your proposed approach such an impactful and innovative solution?

Include a description of the current state of development or readiness of the idea.

Explain why your existing innovation requires further testing and R&D.

You can submit a single appendix as a PDF containing images and diagrams to support your answer. It must be a PDF no larger than 10MB. It can be up to two A4 pages and must be legible at 100% zoom.

This question will be scored against this assessment criterion: How well does the proposal meet the challenge?

Question 7. Technical and societal project summary

What are the main technical and societal challenges you are addressing?

Describe

• what the innovation is

• the specific population demographic you are targeting

• the main technical and societal deliverables

• the research and development that will prove the scientific, social and commercial merit of the project

• any challenges or opportunities relating to equality, diversity and inclusion arising from your project

• what might be achieved by deploying the innovation to address the selected challenge

This question will be scored against this assessment criterion: How valid is the project approach?

Question 8. Current state of the art and intellectual property

Are similar products currently available in the market?

How is your proposed project differentiated from them?

You must include details of:

• any existing intellectual property (IP)

• its significance to your freedom to operate

• novel concepts you develop or employ

• new approaches or technologies you use

• new tools or technologies

You must explain how you would handle any intellectual property (IP) issues which might arise during the project.

If you are working with subcontractors (specialist skills only), include details of how you will maintain freedom to operate and fulfil the IP requirements detailed in the contract.

This question will be scored against these assessment criteria: How innovative is this project? How much does the project develop or employ novel concepts, approaches, methodologies, tools or technologies for this area?

Question 9. Project plan and methodology

Describe your project plan and identify the main milestones.

The plan for this phase 3 must be comprehensive. The emphasis throughout should be on practicality.

Provide evidence that the technology or solution works, can be made into a viable product and can achieve the proposed benefits.

You must:

• describe resources that will be needed to deliver the project

• describe what the main success criteria will be

• identify the project management processes that will ensure you achieve the milestones

• provide a clear plan for further testing and R&D, scaling and commercial feasibility, and the development of a replicable, scalable model

• describe the main technical, societal and commercial risks and what you will do to mitigate them

You must upload a project plan or Gantt chart as an appendix in PDF format. It must be a PDF no larger than 10MB. It can be up to two A4 pages and must be legible at 100% zoom.

Your milestones must:

• be clear

• be defined using SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-bound) criteria

• be associated with the appropriate deliverables and payments

• indicate your payment schedule by month

This question will be assessed against these assessment criteria:

• does the proposal show a clear plan for establishing technical and commercial feasibility

• is there a clear management plan

• what are the main technical and commercial risks to the project’s success

• how will these be effectively managed

• are the milestones and evaluation procedures appropriate

Note: information from the finances section will be used to support the assessment of this question. Proposed milestones and associated payments stated in this section must match those entered in the finance summary on your application.

Question 10. Technical team and expertise

Who is in the technical team? What expertise do they offer?

Provide a brief description of your technical team, including any subcontractors.

Describe:

• how each organisation has the skills, capabilities, and experience to deliver the intended benefits

• how much of their time will be spent on the project

This question will be scored against this assessment criterion: Does the applicant have the skills, capabilities and experience to deliver the intended benefits?

Question 11. Costs and value for money

How much will the project cost? How does it represent value for money for the team and the taxpayer?

Describe:

• the total costs inclusive of VAT (If applicable) you are requesting in terms of the project goals

• how 80% of your requested funding will be spent before 31 March 2026

• how this project represents value for money for you and the taxpayer

• your expected overall costs

Proposed costs stated in this section must match those entered in the finance summary.

All costs quoted must reflect actual costs at a fair market value and not include profit.

You can submit a single appendix as a spreadsheet in PDF format. It must be a PDF no larger than 10MB. It can be up to two A4 pages and must be legible at 100% zoom.

Note that all payments are made quarterly in arrears on submission of an invoice. The invoice must be submitted within 30 days of the end of each monitoring period for all completed milestones.

Full Economic Cost (FEC) calculations are not relevant for Contracts for Innovation competitions. Contracts for Innovation is a competitive process and applications will come from a variety of organisations. Whatever calculation you use to arrive at your total eligible project costs your application will be assessed against applications from other organisations. Bear this in mind when calculating your total eligible project costs. You can include overheads but remember that this is a competitive process.

The assessors are required to judge the application finances in terms of value for money. They will score your finances against these assessment criteria: Are the budget and costs realistic, justified and appropriate for the aims and methods? Is the plan to spend 80% of the funding awarded by 31 March 2026 achievable?

Note: the information from the finances section will be used to support the assessment of this question.

Question 12. Commercial potential

What is the commercial potential of your project? You must focus on your proposed customer’s needs.

Describe your:

• timescales

• projects commercial potential for a marketable product, process or service

• delivery plan

• expected route to market

Describe the competitive advantage that your project has over existing or alternative solutions that meet market needs.

Describe any existing commercial relationships relevant to the project and any new customer relationships you plan to develop.

With the focus on your proposed customer’s needs, you can also mention the future commercial potential across the public or private sector and international markets.

This question will be scored against these assessment criteria:

• is there a clear commercial potential for a marketable product, process or service

• is there a clear plan to deliver that and a clear route to market

• how significant is the competitive advantage of this solution over the nearest currently available solutions to the challenge identified

Question 13. Adoption and Scale

How will you approach building a community of users and adopters to develop and support your innovation?

Describe:

• how you will build a community to support and adopt the solution as part of the project

• how your proposal fits into the ecosystem and any links in to care pathways

• your engagement plan

• how you will identify a lead customer to work with, why that customer was chosen and how you will work with them

• how you will gain appropriate clearances

• any previous engagement with the customer group or community

• how your business plans to scale its activities, for example, geographical, organisation size, revenue, providing clear metrics in your milestones and timelines

This question will be scored against these assessment criteria:

• does this project have potential to scale up its activities

• is there a clear milestone plan to achieve this, whether that is geographical, size of organisation, market size or revenue

• is the project embedded, or has potential to become embedded, in the community ecosystem

• does the project link to, or have potential to link to, appropriate care pathways

Question 14. Business model

What is the proposed business model for driving forward the adoption and scaling of your solution after the project period ends?

Explain how your solution will be supported after the project period ends.

This question will be scored against this assessment criterion: Is there a sustainable business model proposed to scale the adoption, use, and support of the proposed solution?

3. Finances

Enter your project costs, organisation details and funding details.

You must select whether you are VAT registered before entering your eligible project costs. We advise you answer the VAT registered question first before entering your eligible costs. Your total eligible project costs must not exceed £250,000.

If you select you are VAT registered, you must enter your eligible project costs exclusive of VAT. As part of the application process VAT will be automatically calculated and added to your eligible project cost total.

If you select you are not VAT registered, you must enter your eligible project costs exclusive of VAT and no VAT will be added. You will not be able to increase total project costs to cover VAT later should you become VAT registered.

VAT is the responsibility of the invoicing business. We will not provide any further advice and advise you to seek independent advice from HMRC.

Full Economic Cost (FEC) calculations are not relevant for Contracts for Innovation competitions. Contracts for Innovation is a competitive process and applications will come from a variety of organisations.

Whatever calculation you use to arrive at your total eligible project costs your application will be assessed against applications from other organisations. Bear this in mind when calculating your total eligible project costs. You can include overheads but remember that this is a competitive process.

For an overview on what costs you can claim, see our project costs guidance. Note this is general guidance, for specific guidance see the eligibility section in this competition. You can also view our application finances video.

4. Project Impact

This section is not scored but will provide background to your project.

You 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.

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.

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:

CfI - Scaling community based initiatives for diet or exercise - Assessor guidance for applicants .pdf (opens in a new window)

Interviews

If your application passes the first stage of assessment, you may be invited to attend an interview, where you must give a presentation. Your interview will take place either online or at a designated location. The interviews will be held on 21 and 22 July 2025.

If you require any reasonable adjustments to support you at the interview you must email us at support@iuk.ukri.org within three days of receiving your invitation.

Before the interview and by the deadline stated in the invitation email, you:

• must send a list of who will attend the interview

• must send your interview presentation slides

• can send a written response to the assessors’ feedback

List of attendees

Up to three people from your organisation can attend. They must all be available on all published interview dates. We are unable to reschedule slots once allocated.

Presentation slides

Your interview presentation must:

• use Microsoft PowerPoint

• be no longer than 10 minutes

• have no more than 5 slides

• not include any video or embedded web links

You cannot change the presentation after you submit it or bring any additional materials to the interview.

Written response to assessor feedback

This is optional and is an opportunity to answer the assessors’ concerns. It can:

• be up to two A4 pages in a single PDF or Word document

• include charts or diagrams

Interview

After your presentation the panel will spend 20 minutes asking questions. You will be expected to answer based on the information you provided in your application form, presentation and the response to feedback.

After your interview

The panellists will individually score your application and these will be averaged for your overall interview score. This score will supersede the one you received from initial assessment unless stated otherwise in the competition brief. We will notify you whether you have been successful or not by email and you will receive feedback on your interview within a week of notification.

Background and further information

About Contracts for Innovation competitions

Contracts for Innovation provides innovative solutions to challenges faced by the public sector. This can lead to better public services and improved efficiency and effectiveness.

The Contracts for Innovation programme:

• supports economic growth and enables the development of innovative products and services through the public procurement of R&D

• generates new business opportunities for companies

• provides a route to market for new ideas

• creates opportunities to work directly with the public sector

Contracts for Innovation competitions are open to all eligible organisations that can demonstrate a route to market for their solution. Developments are 100% funded and focused on specific identified needs, increasing the chance of exploitation.

Contracts for Innovation encourages the creation and protection of new intellectual property (IP). Applicants retain all the rights to both foreground and background IP but will be expected to grant certain royalty-free licences to the funder for use of the foreground IP.

Contracts for Innovation is a procurement of R&D services. If successful, you will receive a contract to deliver the proposed activity. Costs quoted must reflect actual costs at a fair market value and not include profit.

You must submit an invoice for the work undertaken. All payments are made in arrears on submission of an invoice. Invoices must be submitted within 30 days of the end of each monitoring period for all completed milestones.

If you are VAT registered, your total costs are expected to include VAT that you would charge as a service provider. VAT is the responsibility of the invoicing business and applicants should ensure that VAT has been calculated correctly as part of their application. You will need to confirm your VAT status as part of the application process

Note: we are seeing a rise in double counting of VAT during the application process, making some applicants ineligible. To avoid this, it is important you input your costs minus VAT. VAT is added on by us in the Innovation Funding Service (IFS).

Suppliers for each project will be selected by an open competition process and retain the intellectual property generated from the project, with certain rights of use retained by the contracting authority. This is an excellent opportunity to establish an early customer for a new technology and to fund its development.

Broader information

Social enterprises

A social enterprise is a business that trades in order to create a social impact. It makes money in the same way a business does, by selling goods and services. Revenues are then used to cover costs, pay salaries, to develop the business and to invest into making a difference for the common good.

While social enterprises can make a profit, the core goal is not simply to create wealth. A social enterprise aims to be self-sustaining by trading on a cost-recovery basis and breaking even may be regarded as a successful outcome.

Community based diet and (or) exercise projects will be expected to enhance existing pre-commercial innovations to deliver initiatives that meet local needs and broadly align with the wider government Health Mission.

Ideally social ventures will work closely with Integrated Care Boards (ICBs) to evidence their social impact and show their capacity to scale their business.

To seek a better understanding of growth, scaling or sustainability principles you are encouraged to seek help and information from organisations who support social ventures. You should note that this activity is outside of the competition process, is entirely at your discretion and is not funded by Innovate UK.

Briefing recording and slides

Briefing recording and slides will be available to download here after the briefing event.

Setting up your project

You will be notified by email on the date published for this competition. Notifications may be sent any time up to 5pm.

You must follow the unique link embedded in your email notification. This takes you to your Innovation Funding Service (IFS) Set Up portal, where we gather the information to set up your project.

You will have 30 days (including weekends and bank holidays) to complete all of your project set up. Within this time, you will also be required to submit:

• project location

• any answers to financial or milestone queries we have requested

• any requested documentation to support your project

Your funding offer may be withdrawn if project setup is not completed within this or an alternative timeframe as advised by Innovate UK.

In order for us to process your invoices, 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 milestone payments are 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.

Your Contract

Once you have successfully completed project setup, we will issue your contract. The contract 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 contract. Any costs incurred before your agreed start date cannot be claimed as part of your project.

Your contract start date is provided in the dates and eligibility sections. This cannot be varied and all contracts must start on that date.

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.

We would like to remind you that eligible non-funded business can still benefit from fully funded and bespoke support from the Innovate UK Business Growth service.

Support for SMEs from Innovate UK Business Growth service

Innovate UK Business Growth helps innovation focused businesses make the best strategic choices and access the right resources, in order to grow and ultimately achieve scale.

Our innovation and growth specialists provide our fully funded and bespoke support to clients nationwide. Visit the service’s website to discover whether you could benefit from this advisory support, which is available to Innovate UK funded and non-funded businesses alike.

Protecting your innovation

A Secure Innovation campaign has been developed to help founders and leaders of innovative startups protect their technology, competitive advantage, and reputation.

This was developed by UK’s National Protective Security Authority (NPSA) and the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC).

Data sharing

This competition is operated by Innovate UK.

Innovate UK is directly accountable to you for its holding and processing of your information, including any personal data and confidential information. Data is held in accordance with our own policies.

Innovate UK may also share any relevant information submitted and produced during the application process concerning your application with Innovate UK’s regional UK third parties. For more information see how we handle applicant data.

Innovate UK and Innovate UK Business Connect will be data controllers for personal data submitted during the application.

Innovate UK’s Privacy Policy

Innovate UK Business Connect Privacy Policy

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.

Further help and guidance

If you want help to find an organisation to work with, contact the Innovate UK Business Connect.

If you have any questions about the scope requirements of this competition, email support@iuk.ukri.org.

If you need more information about how to apply or you want to submit your application in Welsh, email support@iuk.ukri.org 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).

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.