Support for SMEs to evaluate innovative medical technologies

The Office for Life Sciences (OLS) in partnership with Innovate UK is to invest up to £1 million to support developers of innovative medicines, medical devices, diagnostics and regulated digital technology to evaluate their product in a real world clinical setting.

This competition aims to provide support for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to generate an evidence base that will enable the evaluation of products that address NHS priorities. This support is intended to allow companies to collect and analyse clinical performance and cost effectiveness data within an NHS setting.

This competition will also fund projects that support the development or design of plans for the collection of clinical data.

Priority will be given to products that address the priorities outlined in the next steps on the NHS 5 year forward view. Developers of medical devices, diagnostics and regulated digital healthcare products should have gained a CE marking. However, you should not have marketed the product in the UK for more than 5 years.

You will need to show how your product is likely to have a significant impact and is aligned with NHS England’s priorities.

You should show how your project will produce evidence of the impact of your technology, and where appropriate increase patient access to innovative technologies.

Specific themes 

Priority will be given to projects that address:

• reducing cancellations or unnecessary appointments in primary and secondary care
• reducing the burden on A&E services
• speeding up diagnosis
• enabling earlier diagnosis of cancer
• supporting the management of long term conditions

Applications should also demonstrate how the project will:

• expand the evidence base by adding data that can contribute to the health technology appraisal process, for instance through comparing the use of the new product against the current standard of care
• support identification of potential breakthrough technologies
• support the establishment of improved methods and systems, and demonstrate how the product combined with health care system adaptation delivers better outcomes at lower cost
• work with the National Institute of Health Research

Proposals should:

• describe the innovative medicine or CE-marked device
• include any current up to date evidence of the product’s clinical performance and cost effectiveness
• demonstrate how the product meets the priority needs defined in next steps on the NHS 5 year forward view, and how it is expected to deliver significant cost savings, health gains or beneficial service impacts, if quickly adopted across NHS England
• provide evidence that you are working with appropriate stakeholders including the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), NHS England, National Institute of Health Research (NIHR) and Academic Health Science Networks (AHSNs)
• include the development or implementation of plans for data collection within the NHS
• outline how studies will generate data on the costs and benefits of a product, allowing evaluation by NICE

Eligibility 

To apply for funding you must:

• be a UK based SME
• carry out your project within the NHS
• have a product that is aligned with the specific priority healthcare areas defined in the next steps on the NHS 5 year forward view
• involve products that have been marketed in the UK for less than 5 years
• be able to outline relevant discussions you have had with key stakeholders, such as NICE, NIHR, NHS England and AHSNs, to demonstrate the feasibility of your proposal

SMEs may work alone or in collaboration with other businesses or research organisations as unfunded partners or sub-contractors. Only the SME leading the project can claim grant.

Project Size 

Total project costs must range in size from £50k to £250k.

Funding and project details

Option 1: project costs of up to £50k

SMEs can apply for support to develop detailed and feasible plans for the collection of relevant data in a clinical setting. It is expected that the development of these plans will involve discussion with appropriate stakeholders in NIHR, NICE and NHS England.

Option 2: project costs of up to £250k

SMEs can apply for support to enable the collection and analysis of real world data that helps evaluate the impact of your product. Plans must have been developed in discussion with NICE and NHS England.

Project types

Projects should focus on understanding evidence gaps, and testing product performance to elucidate the operational impact of your product on NHS service provision.

You could get funding of up to 50% of your eligible project costs.