Innovating innovation funding in 2020

As we enter a new year and new decade, we can be excused for trying to catch our breath and reflecting back on 2020.

2020 was a monumental year for all of us - for all the wrong reasons. It also didn't take a break for Christmas - a new variant of Covid has driven further restrictions, and uncertainty over the EU trade deal added further anxiety to advent.

However, 2020 is also significant in another way for my colleagues at Innovate UK and I. Personally speaking - it's been the most intense yet rewarding experience of my professional career.

In March I was tasked, with my colleagues Neil Morgan and Christian Inglis, with strategising and delivering timely innovation funding for companies which were being directly impacted by the pandemic. 'Speed is more important than perfection' was a key message that we designed our programme around - although as we discovered: speed and perfection are not opposite poles.

In just over a week, we had designed and launched a ￡20m competitive programme which could get money directly into companies' accounts in a manner of weeks instead of months. Everything was reconfigured to be as efficient and as lean as possible, without affecting our impact. Everything apart from the competition's title which was the rather Ronseal-esque 'Business-led innovation in response to global disruption' - internally we simply referenced it as 'Fast Start' or 'Fast Track'.

In mid-April when the whole country was trying to 'flatten the curve', we were all focused on a different curve as we experienced an unprecedented number of applications. All predictions went out of the window as we experienced exponential growth over the two-week period the competition was open - as shown in the diagram below.

This was cumulative, with the submitted applications increasing by nearly 7000 in the last 24 hours, over 2500 of these were in the very last hour. In the end, we received 8619 applications, more than the total which we had received in the previous year.

The applicants had done their work now it was our turn. As impressive as it was that we had a system that could take nearly nine thousand applications, we now had to processes them. Our operations team worked tirelessly (working throughout the day and night and over weekends) to ensure that all the eligible applications were assessed and scored within two weeks of the competition closing. Not only were we working with an unprecedented scale of applications, but we were also working faster than normal to ensure the money got to the UK's most innovative companies as soon as possible.

In the background Innovate UK had secured further funding from the Government to support the UK’s innovation ecosystem during the pandemic. This allowed us to double the original budget from ￡20m to ￡40m. This was fantastic news as the quality of the applications we received was particularly high and we had a considerable number which merited being funded.

In the end we were able to fund 865 projects - which is the largest portfolio we've ever had from one competition. You'll be forgiven for thinking that this activity was an exercise in speed and scale - as we hold the record from both the largest and the fastest competition. However, these are just two of the many characteristics of what has proven to be a fascinating programme.

Innovation 1: Cohorts - strength in numbers & knowledge transfer

As I may have mentioned 865 is a quite a few projects. This raised a few questions regarding how best to manage them, especially in the middle of lockdown when I wasn't allowed to visit my barbers around the corner, let alone an innovative SME over a hundred miles from my house.

It was agreed that the best way to deal with them was to segment them by subject area. I, rather foolishly, decided that the best method for segmentation was to read through every project summary. As it was my idea, I thought it would be appropriate if I did it myself and didn't inflict this on my colleagues - however, I've heard that my family missed me a bit during that particular week.

This piece of work allowed us to categorise the projects and communicate this to internal and external stakeholders easily and quickly - which enabled us to be agile and capitalise on further opporunities. It also allowed us to see patterns in the funding, for example the most popular subject-matter was EdTech with around 70 projects ranging from early years to occupational training. There was also a significant number of projects (around 60) on PPE - roughly split between advanced PPE filters, reusable PPE and rapid on-site production.

This process also directly benefited the companies - as we held virtual consortium events for companies to present their project and network. We are already seeing these activities pay dividends as companies are collaborating with each other, and well as combining their efforts to overcome industries barriers (often involving procurement). These events were led by Dr Abigail Hird from the Knowledge Transfer Network - and it's highlighted the significant benefits of likeminded companies being able to network whilst working on their individual projects.

Innovation 2: Open to other funders

One of the issues of running a popular competition with highscoring submissions is that we ran out of funding before we ran out of applications. We secured agreement to circulate the list of highest scoring unfunded projects to other funders who could potentially support them. This was one of the first times that this had been done and it was a great success. Additional funding was found internally in UKRI which focused on the projects within specific challenge areas. External funding was sourced where the focus was on companies within a specific geographrical region.

All in all around 100 additional projects were funded via other sources - all based on a company's original application. This is a fantastic example of how centralised funding can lead to efficiencies, without diluting the objectives of the funder or the businesses being supported.

Innovation 3: Follow on funding

Another pilot innovation was that we allowed companies to apply for follow-on funding to increase the impact of their project. The application was designed to be as lean as possible. and the majority of the submission was based on the existing documentation which companies already had to complete during the monitoring process.

We've learnt so much from running this particular pilot. It cannot be stressed enough how useful the process that we developed will be for future Innovate UK and UKRI funding programmes. I anticipate these processes will be adopted by colleagues over the coming months, which is fantastic news for the companies we support.

Don't bore us, get to the chorus

Obviously, it doesn't matter how agile, innovative, or scalable these new funding activities are if they don't make an impact. So, you probably want to ask: 'This is all nice Tom, but where's the beef?".

The beef

I've been working at Innovate UK for nearly 7 years and during this time I have allocated tens of millions of pounds of funding to hundreds of companies and attended countless close-out meetings. I've seen all manner of projects, and seen how much difference our funding can make, but nothing prepared me for consistent high quality of 'fast start' project meetings.

The first project I 'visited' was from Under the Doormat. They used our funding to develop 'Trusted Stays' the sustainable long-term successor of NHS Homes, which had offered over 2500 homes of free accommodation (worth over ￡20m) to NHS staff during the height of Covid. This was exactly the type of project we envisioned when we put the competition together: it had both economic benefits (critical cashflow for the hospitality sector) and obvious societal impacts.

It was so energising to see how our funding had made something so impactful happen in a manner of months, but was this a one-off or just the high-water mark for our projects? The answer to this was simply no. Day after day and week after week we jumped on Zoom to speak to these companies and the quality and ingenuity of the work, we funded was mind-blowing. There were remote ICU services from Proximie to support staff who were over stretched or less familiar with the needs of critically ill patients. As well as this I spoke to EMSOL who developed a sensor-based system to ensure that the construction industry can operate safely during the Covid-19 restrictions. Last but not least, I spoke to start-ups like Tidze and Gramrphone who had developed digital platforms to help the UK's creative industries distribute and monetise their content globally via streaming.

Other high points were the development and production for the first MHRA approved reusable face mask - I don't have one, but I'm aware it's what the Queen uses. Sano Genetics developed their platform to facilitate digital data collection and at-home DNA testing from >1,000 people affected by Long COVID to accelerate the development of early detection strategies, biomarkers, and potential treatments - which was featured on Channel 4. Lastly, we have funded a number of companies who fortuitously developed new technologies to improve the cold-chain for Covid vaccinations. They are currently exploring opportunities around the world where a significant amount of the Pfizer vaccinations have been procured and/or there is a warmer climate.

Millions saw the apple fall, but only Newton asked why

This whole activity had demonstrated how quickly we can respond when faced with such a challenge. The next challenge will be ensuring that we all learn the right lessons from this programme - why have we seen this success? The thorough and appropriate evaluation is forthcoming, expedited as the majority of the projects are due to end near in March. It seems that this report could be used a blueprint for how all funding agencies adapt to improve efficiency, agility and responsiveness to our rapidly changing world.

Creative future?

As somebody who has looked after Innovate UK's creative industries strategy for five years, I am particularly interested in exploring why this call resonated so well with the sector. Of the 865 initial project, 105 were from the creative industries (a greater proportion than we are used to) and of these 70% were new to Innovate UK funding. If we are interested in addressing the pressing challenges the pandemic continues to raise to this valuable sector (which contributes almost ￡13m to the UK economy every hour) then it seems appropriate that we learn the lessons of this programme and explore how they can be replicated and improved. Hopefully, future funding can be secured to address this - as my colleagues in the 'Fast Track' team agree that this is should be the next priority for this programme and process.

One more thing...

If you've got this far you may be interested in some of case-study films we have made: former Executive Chair Ian Campbell visiting a blueberry farm, regional manager of Scotland Bob Martin visiting a flour mill and yours truly slumming with WOMAD at Peter Gabriel's Real World Studios. *All social distancing protocols were followed at time of recordings.

Tom Fiddian - Head of AI and Data Economy Programmes, Innovate UK

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