Businesses can apply for loans for innovative projects with strong commercial potential to significantly improve the UK economy.
Sponsoring Agency: Innovate UK
Type of Fund: Loan/Finance
Deadline Available: Available
Deadline Date (mm/dd/yyyy): 06/02/2021
Size of the Fund: More than $1 Million
Businesses can apply for loans for innovative projects with strong commercial potential to significantly improve the UK economy.
Innovate UK is offering up to £20 million in loans to micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Loans are for highly innovative late stage projects with the best game changing and disruptive ideas or concepts. There should be a clear route to commercialisation and economic impact.
Your project must aim to develop new products, processes or services which are significantly ahead of anything similar in the field. You can also propose an innovative use of existing products, processes or services.
Applications can come from any area of technology and be applied to any part of the economy.
Your project must focus on commercialisation, growth or scale up. We will give priority to proposals likely to lead to growth and gains in productivity.
You must be able to show that you:
• can cover interest payments
• will be able to repay the loan on time
• need public funding
Your project can include:
• prototyping
• demonstrating
• piloting
• testing
• validation
Specific Themes
Your proposal must demonstrate:
• an appropriate and evidenced loan request
• a clear route to commercial success with potential to make a significant and positive impact on the UK economy and productivity
• realistic, significant potential for global markets
• a strong management team
• why you are unable to fund the project from your own resources or other forms of public or private-sector funding
Funding Information
• Loans of between £250,000 and £1.6 million are available to fund your project’s eligible costs.
• Projects can last up to 4 years, including both the R&D and commercialisation phases. Projects are expected to start by September 2021.
Eligibility Criteria
• To take on an innovation loan for a project you must:
o be a UK registered SME
o intend to exploit the results from or in the UK
o give evidence that your business is suitable to take on a loan
• Individuals, academic institutions, research organisations and large companies are not eligible for innovation loans.
Only single businesses can receive loans, so collaboration with other organisations cannot be funded in this competition.
More information at: https://apply-for-innovation-funding.service.gov.uk/competition/899/overview#summary
Eligible Countries:
United Kingdom
