UK - Germany Bilateral: Collaborative R&D Round 2

Your project must:

- have a maximum grant funding request of £750,000

- start by 1 July 2024

- end by 30 June 2027

- last between 18 and 36 months

UK project partners must carry out the majority of their project work in the UK and intend to exploit the results from or in the UK.

Your project must demonstrate a balanced technological contribution by the participants from both countries and must be equally significant to all participants.

Note that eligibility on the German counterpart competition also states that in a project with two cooperating partners, no partner may contribute more than 70% of total person months to the project. Person months is the metric for the time in months devoted by staff to a project.

In a project with more than two cooperating partners, no partner may contribute more than 50% of total person months. All research organisations involved in the consortium may altogether not contribute more than 50% of the total person months.

Your application must be in line with the rules of Innovate UK and The Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action (BMWK).

Applications identified as not eligible by either Innovate UK or BMWK will not be sent for assessment.

Your project must always start on the first of the month and this must be stated within your application. Your project start date will be reflected in your grant offer letter if you are successful.

You must only include eligible project costs in your application.

Under current restrictions, this competition will not fund any procurement, commercial, business development or supply chain activity with any Russian and Belarusian entity as lead, partner or subcontractor. This includes any goods or services originating from a Russian and Belarusian source.

If your project’s total grant funding request or duration falls outside of our eligibility criteria, you must provide justification by email to support@iuk.ukri.org at least 10 working days before the competition closes. We will decide whether to approve your request.

If you have not requested approval or your application has not been approved by us, you will be made ineligible. Your application will then not be sent for assessment.

Lead organisation

To lead a project your organisation must:

- be a UK registered business of any size

- be or involve at least one grant claiming UK micro, small or medium-sized enterprise (SME)

- collaborate with at least one German registered SME applying to the German ZIM programme, which must be a separate legal entity, not linked to the UK partners

More information on the different types of organisation can be found in our Funding rules.

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

- public sector organisation

- research and technology organisation (RTO)

Only UK registered partners must be listed in the Project Partner section of your application on the Innovation Funding Service (IFS). Your German partner will not receive any of this UK competition funding. German partners will be funded by the German ZIM programme, following a parallel application.

Each organisation in your consortium will receive funding from its respective national funding body.

Each UK partner organisation must be invited into the Innovation Funding Service by the lead to collaborate on a project. Once partners have accepted the invitation, they will be asked to login or to create an account in the Innovation Funding Service. They are responsible for entering their own project costs and completing their Project Impact questions in the application.

Non-funded partners

Your project can include partners, including overseas partners, that do not receive any of this competition’s funding. Their costs will count towards the total project costs.

Subcontractors

Subcontractors are allowed in this competition.

You can use subcontractors from the UK, Germany and other countries but must make the case in your application as to why you could not use suppliers from the countries providing grant funding for the project. All subcontractors must be selected through your usual procurement process.

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

All subcontractor costs must be justified and appropriate for the project.

Number of applications

An eligible UK business can lead on one application and collaborate on two further applications.

If an organisation is not leading any application, it can collaborate in up to three applications.

Application guidance for German organisations

For guidance for German organisations, see Supporting Information.

Up to £4 million from Innovate UK, and a minimum of €4 million from the German BMWK, has been allocated to fund innovation projects in this competition. Funding will be in the form of a grant.

Each country will fund its eligible participants according to their national procedure and funding rules. Funding conditions and eligibility criteria may vary between UK and Germany. The bilateral joint cooperation between the partners and its added value is an important aspect to be considered within the evaluation.

UK Partners

If your UK 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.

For 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

For more information on company sizes, please refer to the company accounts guidance.

If you are applying for an award funded under State aid Regulations, the definitions are set out in the European Commission Recommendation of 6 May 2003.

Research participation for UK organisations

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

The aim of this competition is to enhance UK and German collaborations and capabilities in the emerging fields of technology in our society. The result being, the developing and delivering of new innovations and applications of the technologies across a broad range of other sectors.

This competition will support UK and German business-led collaboration in innovation with grant funding.

Innovate UK will support UK businesses to collaborate successfully with German counterparts and build their global growth prospects.

Your collaborative R&D proposal must demonstrate:

- a clear game-changing or disruptive innovative idea leading to new products, processes or services

- a strong and deliverable business proposal within your application that addresses and documents market potential and needs

- sound, practical financial plans and timelines

- good value for money

- how you intend to deliver significant economic impact, return on investment (ROI) and growth through commercialisation within 2 to 3 years of project completion

- clear potential to significantly benefit the UK economy or national productivity

- the benefit of participants from the countries working together and how this adds value

- a clear definition of where intellectual property (IP) can be used and shared between the participants and countries

- a clear route to market within 2 to 3 years of project completion

Portfolio approach
We want to fund a variety of projects across different technology areas. We call this a portfolio approach.

Proposals can come from any area of technology, and we particularly encourage applications from the following sectors:

AI

We encourage applications in the areas of:

- sustainable AI

- responsible and ethical AI

- applications of AI to improve business productivity in BridgeAI target sectors

- AI for healthcare

Quantum

We encourage projects that:

- involve consortia which span the supply chain of service or component suppliers, integrators, and end user businesses

- progress quantum technology from lab prototypes to industry ready systems for commercial use through integration of innovative and scalable technologies

Your project can focus on one or more of the following areas:

- sensing and imaging

- component and sub system technologies supporting communications, computing and networking

- scalable solutions and fabrication processes for chip scale quantum photonic and optoelectronic systems

- software hardware codesign for reproducible quantum processor enhanced applications

Semiconductors

We encourage applications in the areas of:

- semiconductor design

- compound semiconductors

- advanced packaging and heterogeneous integration

- advanced materials

Future Telecommunications

We encourage applications in the areas of:

- non-terrestrial communications

- open radio access network (ORAN) deployments and innovations

- use of AI and data analytics to improve network efficiency

- energy efficient technologies

- neutral host networks

- antenna innovation, massive multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO)

- cross border lab collaborations

- network security

Engineering Biology

Your proposal must align with one of the National Engineering Biology Programme’s themes, or focus on the development of cross cutting technology or service development.

The themes are:

- food systems

- biomedicine

- clean growth

- environmental solutions

Green Technologies

Battery technology:

- advanced battery materials

- emerging battery technologies, for example; sodium ion, lithium sulfur, solid state

- technologies to achieve 350 Wh/kg and above at pack level

- innovations in battery manufacturing processes

- design innovation for cells, modules, packs

- integration of digitalisation

- advanced predictive analytics and degradation modelling

- sustainable recycling approaches

- technologies for increased safety

- skills development and training

Research categories

We will fund industrial research projects and experimental development projects, as defined in the guidance on categories of research.

4 September 2023: Competition opens

13 September 2023: Online briefing event: register to attend

6 December 2023, 11:00am: Competition closes

3 April 2024: Applicants notified

You must read the guidance on applying for a competition on the Innovation Funding Service before you start.

Before submitting, it is the lead applicant’s responsibility to make sure:

• that all the information provided in the application is correct
• your proposal meets the eligibility and scope criteria
• all sections of the application are marked as complete
• that all UK partners have completed all assigned sections and accepted the terms and conditions (T&Cs)

You can reopen your application once submitted, up until the competition deadline. You must resubmit the application before the competition deadline.

What we ask you

The application is split into four sections:

1. Project details.
2. Application questions.
3. Finances.
4. Project Impact.

Accessibility and inclusion

We welcome and encourage applications from people of all backgrounds and are committed to making our application process accessible to everyone. This includes providing support, in the form of reasonable adjustments, for people who have a disability or a long-term condition and face barriers applying to us. Watch the video on how we are making our application process more accessible and inclusive for everyone.

You must contact us as early as possible in the application process. We recommend contacting us at least 15 working days before the competition closing date to ensure we can provide you with the most suitable support possible.

You can contact us by emailing support@iuk.ukri.org or calling 0300 321 4357. Our phone lines are open from 9am to 5pm, Monday to Friday (excluding bank holidays).

You can find more information on the application questions here. 

The UK and Germany are collaborating to deliver bilateral funding through Innovate UK grant support and the Central Innovation Programme (ZIM) grant funding from The Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action (BMWK).

The ZIM programme in Germany is designed to enhance companies' capacity to innovate and to strengthen their long term competitiveness. Under ZIM, German companies and the research institutes they work with can be awarded grants for ambitious R&D projects.

With ZIM, funding is not restricted to any particular field of technology, nor to specific fields of application. Whether or not an application for a grant is approved depends on how innovative the R&D project is and how marketable the results are likely to be.

Application guidance for German organisations

Each German project partner must submit a separate, individual ZIM application to AiF Projekt GmbH (ZIM project management agency on behalf of the BMWK). German organisations in receipt of a ZIM grant within the last 24 months cannot reapply to the programme.

Every German SME, in accordance with the relevant EU regulations, as well as medium-sized companies with fewer than 500 employees (or full-time equivalents), which carry out R&D for the development of innovative products, processes or technical services, are eligible to apply.

Other medium-sized companies with fewer than 1,000 employees are eligible to apply for funding if they cooperate with at least one SME (EU definition) whose project is being funded.

Research organisations are eligible to apply as cooperation partners of eligible companies. Detailed criteria for submitting applications and the ZIM application form are available on the ZIM website and you can also contact the AiF Projekt GmbH directly.

Please note that applicants to the ZIM programme are able to define their contribution to the project in person months, for example through work packages rather than in monetary costs.

The ZIM application must comply with the ZIM regulations and be written in German. If you do not have previous experience of ZIM applications, we recommend you contact Aif Projekt GmbH at least 6 weeks prior to the deadline for guidance.

All interested German applicants may submit an optional German Project Sketch to ZIM. For more information visit the webpage.

Note: Every German project partner must file an individual ZIM application to AiF Projekt GmbH.

For each German partner, the ZIM proposal application form must be submitted. For more information visit the webpage or contact AiF Projekt GmbH as mentioned below.

The ZIM application includes several documents: those are, for example, a:

- convenience translation of English documents such as the cooperation agreement

- full project description in German language (Anlage 4)

- copy of the current excerpt from the commercial register

- version of the Proposal Application Form, prepared jointly in English and legally signed by all partners participating in the project

The Proposal Application Form is available for German participants to download.

For any queries regarding the German element of the application, please contact:

Paula Schnippering

AiF Projekt GmbH
Tschaikowskistrasse 49

13156 Berlin, Germany
Phone: +49 (0)30 48163-493

p.schnippering@aif-projekt-gmbh.de

www.zim.de/international

For more information on next steps post application, please see here.