MSI Improving energy or resource efficiency in manufacturing FS

Overview

As part of the Made Smarter Innovation Challenge (MSI), Innovate UK will invest up to £2 million in innovation projects to examine the feasibility of developing new industrial digital technologies. These are for micro, small or medium sized enterprise (SME) manufacturers to improve their energy or resource efficiency that would lead to a more productive, resilient and sustainable sector.

Each feasibility study must include:

executive summary
description of product or service
technical considerations
marketplace and financial feasibility
marketing strategy, including a plan to commercialise your proposed product when fully developed
draft specification of proposed product or solution
conclusion and recommendations

Scope

Your project must focus on the innovation of a unique digital application relating to one or more of the energy or resource efficiencies listed in the Specific Themes section, and must be:

affordable
easy to use
scalable across SMEs

There is no limit to the number of processes or technology solutions you may address in your proposal, and there is no advantage in using more than one.

Energy or resource efficiency innovations that use processes other than those listed will also be considered.

Planned outputs from the study must:

have a clear indication of how your innovation might improve energy or resource efficiency in a manufacturing environment
clearly indicate how your innovation will result in a solution that will be sufficiently affordable, easy to use, and scalable
have technical, operational, and financial feasibility
include potential patents
include targeted market and scale-up plans

Innovate UK wants to fund a variety of projects across different technologies, sectors, markets, and themes. This is called a portfolio approach.

Specific themes

Your project must focus on one or more of the following.

Energy efficiencies:

boilers and steam
air compressors or vacuum
motors, drivers, pumps or hydraulics
induction or welding
chilling or freezing
spray, extraction or dryers
ovens, kilns or furnaces
heavy machinery or presses

Resource efficiencies:

raw material waste
production process waste
packaging waste
maintenance or service station waste
utilities waste
end of life waste

Funding Costs

Up to £2 million has been allocated to fund innovation projects in this competition. Funding will be in the form of a grant.

If your organisation’s work on the project is commercial or economic, your funding request must not exceed the limits below. These limits apply even if your organisation normally acts non-economically but for the purpose of this project will be undertaking commercial or economic activity.

The balance between your total eligible project costs and the amount of grant awarded must be funded by the organisation receiving the grant.

For feasibility studies, organisations can get funding for eligible project costs of:

up to 70% if you are a micro or small organisation
up to 60% if you are a medium-sized organisation
up to 50% if you are a large organisation

Eligibility

Your project must:

have total costs between £25,000 and £100,000
last between 3 and 6 months
carry out its project work in the UK
intend to exploit the results from or in the UK
not start before 1 October 2025
end 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 Grant Offer Letter has been approved by Innovate UK. Any delays within Project Setup may mean we need to delay your project start date.

You must not start your project until your Grant Offer Letter has been approved by Innovate UK. Any delays within the project setup may mean we delay your project start date.

You must only include eligible project costs in your application.

Lead organisation

To work alone your organisation must be a UK registered business of any size. To lead a collaborative project, your organisation must be a UK registered business of any size.

Academic institutions cannot lead or work alone.

Project team

To collaborate with the lead, your organisation must be one of the following UK registered:

business of any size
academic institution
charity
not for profit
research and technology organisation (RTO)

If collaborating, each partner organisation must be invited into the Innovation Funding Service (IFS) by the lead collaborator on the project. Once partners have accepted the invitation, they will be asked to login or to create an account in the IFS. They are responsible for entering their own project costs in the application.

To be an eligible collaborator, the lead and at least one other organisation must:

apply for funding when entering their costs into the application.
include rationale for the collaboration and describe the structure in your application
ensure any one collaborator does not account for more than 70% of the total eligible costs

Non-funded partners

Your project can include non-UK partners, including partners based in the EU, who bring their own funding. Non-UK partners are permitted to carry out project work from within their home countries and exploit results overseas. Their costs will count towards the total eligible project costs.

Subcontractors

Subcontractors are allowed in this competition. Subcontractors can be from anywhere in the UK and you must select them through your usual procurement process.

You can use subcontractors from overseas but must make the case in your application as to why you cannot use subcontractors from the UK.

You must provide a detailed rationale, evidence of the potential UK contractors you approached and the reasons why they were unable to work with you. We will not accept a cheaper cost as a sufficient reason to use an overseas subcontractor.

All subcontractor costs must be justified and appropriate to the total eligible project costs.

Number of applications

A business can lead and be included as a collaborator in any number of applications. If an organisation is not leading any application, it can collaborate in any number of applications.

Exclusions

Innovate UK will not fund projects that:

do not support the challenges outlined in the scope of this competition
do not evidence the potential for your proposed innovation to generate positive economic or societal impact
duplicate other UK government or EU funded initiatives already funded
are covered by existing commercial agreements
fall outside of manufacturing according to a process in a controlled environment (such as traditional methods of on-site construction) or manufacturing supply chains.

They cannot fund projects that are:

dependent on export performance, for example, giving a subsidy to a baker on the condition that it exports a certain quantity of bread to another country
dependent on domestic inputs usage, for example, giving a subsidy to a baker on the condition that it uses 50% UK flour in their product

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