First of a kind deployment of innovation

Major trends and challenges are creating enormous pressures on the complex and interdependent social and technical infrastructure systems that underpin modern societies. These trends and challenges include:

• ageing populations
• urbanisation
• changes in the ways we live and work
• climate change

These pressures and planned major infrastructure projects will create domestic and export opportunities for UK businesses. These businesses must be able to develop, commercialise or adopt innovative solutions that are quick, easy, cost-effective and provide:

• extra capacity
• adaptability
• resilience
• future-proofingother novel functionalities

The aim of this competition is to enable selected innovative infrastructure systems solutions to take the final step to market readiness by proving:

• repeatable financing and business cases for the innovation
• that the innovation delivers the expected outcomes when integrated in complex real-world applications

To be in scope, your projects will need to support innovative solutions for system challenges in:

• energy generation and supply
• connected transport
• urban living

And, you should base your proposal on at least one of the following:

• solutions for affordable, sustainable and secure energy delivery
• solutions for connected transport through the integration of multimodal transportation systems
• integrated solutions to systemic challenges in urban areas
• resilience of infrastructure and cities to environmental and societal pressure

Phase 1

Phase 1 will fund the integration of new solutions into complex real-world projects. At the end of this phase, you will need to provide a business case for using the solution in a commercial environment. You will need to advise the amount of funding you will need from Innovate UK to carry out your project.

You will also need to advise how you would use alternative finance products, if available in the future, to develop a similar project. You should apply for the lowest amount of funding needed to carry out your project. As this is public money, you will need to show how you are providing value.