MyWorld Collaborative Research & Development

Key Features

UK registered organisations can apply for a share of up to £2million for collaborative R&D projects in creative technology.

Programme:     Innovate UK

Award:     Share of up to £2 million

Opens: 25th Apr 2022

Closes: 1st Jun 2022

! This scheme is now closed

Overview

Innovate UK, part of UK Research and Innovation, is delivering this competition on behalf of MyWorld, a project funded by the UKRI Strength in Places Fund. It builds on the West of England’s strengths in creative media production, technology and research.

MyWorld is a 5 year programme that presents opportunities to create, deliver and understand experiences in creative technology, driving forward the future of media in the UK and beyond.

Scope

The aim of this competition is to support business focused research and innovation in the creative industries in the West of England.

MyWorld supports the generation of innovative ideas and solutions for the creative industries. It addresses the need to develop diverse technologies associated with:

  • the capture, manipulation, distribution and consumption of experiences effectively
  • the understanding of audiences’ responses-to and interactions-with those experiences

This includes the requirement to deliver adaptive audience experiences efficiently, at scale and quality across a multitude of devices.

Your project must:

  • provide solutions that tackle new or emerging challenges or needs of the Creative Continuum
  • demonstrate a realistic potential to deliver business growth, scale up, and job creation
  • actively share knowledge and outputs with the MyWorld programme and wider creative technology industry

MyWorld will select and fund a range of projects from the applications received.

Specific Themes

Your project must focus on screen based and immersive technologies within the creative sector industries.

Creating experiences:

How acquisition, production and delivery relate to narrative, aesthetic and content type in modulating experience, leading to new intelligent acquisition and production methods that facilitate immersion.

For example:

  • utilising machine learning for virtual human capture
  • rigging and animation
  • low light video acquisition and restoration
  • creation and testing of automated physical platforms for cameras
  • refining motion capture data with machine learning and large datasets

Delivering experiences:

Platforms, network technology and representations that support new forms of content delivery and interactivity, delivery processes that ensure the preservation of immersive properties during transmission.

For example:

  • developing Mobile Edge Computing to support enhanced location accuracy
  • improved latency
  • media aware network slicing
  • exploiting the potential of deep learning for enhancing video compression

Measuring experiences:

Perceptually robust means of assessing media quality and immersion that inform creative practice and editorial decision making and that differentiate the impacts of technology and narrative.

For example:

  • creation of new tools and platforms for audience assessment
  • assessment of existing tools and platforms

We define screen based and immersive experiences as multisensory narrative or interactive experiences mediated through technologies including:

  • ambisonic and binaural sound
  • application of Artificial intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) to creative technology
  • audience assessment, measurement tools and platforms
  • distribution technologies, 5G, EDGE,
  • filming and post production tools, including virtual production studios, drones, robotics,
  • haptics and other sensory interfaces
  • virtual, mixed and augmented reality (VR, AR, MR)
  • other creative, content and screen experiences and interfaces, including but not limited to, public displays, live events, theatre, cinema, hybrid performance, emerging devices, for example: AR glasses

Examples of the industry sectors this may address include:

  • advertising and marketing
  • design, product, graphic and fashion
  • broadcast, film, TV, video and audio
  • computer games and services
  • heritage, museums, archives, galleries and libraries
  • live events, music, performing and visual arts
  • sports and esports
  • creator tools and services, including user generated
  • production and consumer electronics

Neither list is intended to be exhaustive.

We will consider all proposals that address the challenge areas and meet the criteria for eligibility.

Eligibility

Your project must:

  • have a total grant funding request of between £100,000 and £200,000
  • start by 1 January 2023
  • end by 31 December 2024
  • last between 12 and 24 months
  • carry out all of its project work in the UK
  • intend to exploit the results from or in the West of England area

To lead a project or your organisation must:

  • be a UK registered business of any size, not for profit or charity
  • collaborate with other UK registered organisations
  • intend to exploit the results from or in the West of England area

Academic institutions cannot lead but can be a collaborative partner.

The lead organisation may be based outside of the West of England area. Justification must be made in your application as to why the project could not be led by an organisation from the West of England area.

The lead organisation must collaborate with at least one research organisation or research and technology organisation in the West of England area.

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
  • public sector organisation
  • research and technology organisation (RTO)

Subcontractors are allowed in this competition.

You cannot use a previously submitted application to apply for this competition.

Exclusions

Innovate UK will not fund projects that:

  • do not demonstrate the potential to positively impact on the economy of the West of England area
  • do not demonstrate clear advancement of technology and potential application or novel application of existing technology to solve challenges
  • request substantial funding for non-UK based partners or subcontractors
  • do not meet the competition eligibility or scope
  • do not address the size, potential and access to market for the innovation
  • do not evidence the potential for their idea or concept to lead to significant return on investment (ROI), positive economic impact, growth and scale-up of the business
  • do not commit to sharing their knowledge and outputs with the MyWorld Programme and wider industry
  • 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
  • are 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

Funding Costs

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

If the majority of 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.

For feasibility studies and industrial research projects, you could get funding for your 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

For experimental development projects which are nearer to market, you could get funding for your eligible project costs of:

  • up to 45% if you are a micro or small organisation
  • up to 35% if you are a medium sized organisation
  • up to 25% if you are a large organisation

The research organisations undertaking non-economic activity as part of the project can share up to 30% of the total eligible project costs. If your consortium contains more than one research organisation undertaking non-economic activity, this maximum is shared between them.

Of that 30% you could get funding for your eligible project costs of up to:

  • 80% of full economic costs (FEC) if you are a Je-S registered institution such as an academic
  • 100% of your project costs if you are an RTO, charity, not for profit organisation, public sector organisation or research organisation

Interested in applying for this competition?

Book an appointment to speak to one of our advisors to discuss your eligibility to apply for this Grant Funding opportunity.