Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund
Overview
The Government’s Industrial Strategy: Building a Britain fit for the future outlines the UK’s long-term plan to boost the productivity and earning power of people throughout the country. In this strategy, the government commits to reach 2.4% of GDP investment in R&D by 2027 and to reach 3% of GDP in the longer term, placing us in the top quartile of OECD countries. If this target is met, it could increase public and private R&D investment by as much as £80bn over the ten years.
To realise the Industrial Strategy objectives, the Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund (ISCF) provides funding to bring together leading research and industry to tackle the big societal and industrial challenges.
The Grand Challenges
All ISCF investment aligns with one of the four Grand Challenges outlined in the Industrial Strategy namely:
Challenge Areas
The ISCF has adopted a challenge-led approach whereby all challenge areas identified align to a Grand Challenge and are informed by industry.
Current challenge areas include:
Opportunities
The ISCF is managed by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) and the various funding calls are administered by UKRI (either by Innovate UK or specific Research Councils). There is no single system that advertises live ISCF competition calls, they are published by whoever is administering them. If Innovate UK, then calls are published on the Innovation Funding Service and if Research Councils then please check their website directly. In some cases, the projects allocated substantial funding, release smaller funding pots for academic projects so explore the challenge areas aligned with your research to find out more.
Keen to Discuss Further?
If you want to discuss opportunities around the ISCF, please get in touch with the Research and Innovation Office: RIO@napier.ac.uk