Innovate UK has published its Delivery Plan 2016-2017, outlining how it plans to invest around £561 million into helping businesses innovate, with the bioeconomy one of its priorities.
The plan for the financial year explains a number of significant changes to the way the agency will work, including a new sector focus that makes it easier for industry and investors to work with, a five-point plan to underpin activity across the sectors and increasing regional presence.
The agency will be running a number of competitions throughout the year and has said that exploiting the outputs of bioscience ‘will underpin many new products and services across the bio-economy’ and is therefore making it one of its funding priorities.
The competition that will run include:
- two broad Health and Life Sciences competitions;
- two broad Manufacturing and Materials;
- two ‘open’ funding competitions per year for applications from any sector;
- open knowledge transfer competitions; and
- an open ‘growth and scale’ competition in Q3
In the foreword to the year plan, Dr Ruth McKernan CBE, Chief Executive of Innovate UK, said: “Whether you have a small or large business or are involved in any way in innovation, this plan will explain how we are working this year to accelerate its pace – and ultimately increase UK productivity and growth.”
Since 2007, Innovate UK has invested £1.8 billion in innovation, which has been more than matched by the private sector. This investment has returned between £11.5 billion and £13.1 billion to the economy. They have supported innovation in 7,600 organisations, creating around 55,000 new jobs.
The Innovate UK 2016-2017 Delivery Plan can be downloaded here.