Innovate UK is to invest up to £10 million in collaborative research and development and feasibility studies to accelerate the commercialisation of highly innovative technologies for civil aerospace.
We are looking for projects that offer solutions to key aerospace industry challenges and for opportunities to bring in technologies and capabilities from outside the traditional aerospace sector.
Proposals for both project types must be collaborative and led by a business. We expect collaborative research and development projects to be mainly industrial research. Large business partners will generally attract up to 50% public funding for their eligible project costs for industrial research and feasibility studies, a medium-sized business up to 60% and a small or micro business up to 70%.
We strongly encourage the participation of SMEs and organisations from outside the traditional aerospace sector. We also strongly encourage universities and research organisations to participate, where their high-end academic knowledge and innovation expertise will bring significant benefit to projects.
We expect collaborative R&D projects to range in size from total costs of £250,000 to £1.5 million. Feasibility studies are expected to have total project costs of up to £100,000.
The competition opens for both types of project application on 29 June 2015. Collaborative R&D projects will follow a two-stage process. The deadline for registration is at noon on 9 September 2015 and the deadline for expressions of interest is at noon on 16 September 2015. For feasibility studies the deadline for registration is at noon on 5 November 2015 and the deadline for applications is at noon on 12 November 2015.
A consortium-building and networking event will be held at
The Oval cricket ground in Kennington, London, on
28 April 2015. There will be a webinar briefing event for potential applicants on 15 July 2015.