Referral of the proposed Life Sciences Innovative Manufacturing Fund by Office for Life Sciences

The Subsidy Advice Unit (SAU) has accepted a request for a report providing advice to Office for Life Sciences (OLS) concerning its proposed Life Sciences Innovative Manufacturing Fund subsidy scheme for 2025-2030 (LSIMF)

From:
Competition and Markets Authority
Published
20 May 2024
Case type:
SAU referral
Case state:
Open
Market sector:
Pharmaceuticals

Administrative timetable

Phase 1 Action
28 June 2024 SAU’s report to be published
3 June 2024 Deadline for receipt of any third-party submissions (submissions after 5pm on this date may not be taken into account)
17 May 2024 Beginning of reporting period

Request from OLS

17 May 2024: The SAU has accepted a request for a report from OLS concerning the proposed LSIMF scheme. This request relates to a Subsidy Scheme of Particular Interest.

The SAU will prepare a report, which will provide an evaluation of the OLS’s assessment of whether the scheme complies with the subsidy control requirements (Assessment of Compliance). The SAU will complete its report within 30 working days.

Information about the scheme provided by OLS

The Life Sciences Innovative Manufacturing Fund (LSIMF)’s policy objective is to expand the UK’s life sciences manufacturing capabilities, by incentivising private investment through capital grants to businesses. The fund will be a grant competition, and seeks to select applicants that will have the greatest impact in delivering the following objectives:

  • increasing health resilience in the UK through increased domestic capacity, or by providing flexible capabilities that have the ability to be re-deployed

  • creating economic opportunity through investments that will make a substantial contribution to Gross Value Added and provide high-wage, high-skilled jobs

The programme has a budget of £520 million, to be delivered between financial years 2025/26 and 2029/30. It builds on previous capital grant competitions for the life sciences sector.

It will be targeted at projects that will manufacture human medicines, medical diagnostics, and MedTech products. Projects with a total cost (including capital expenditure and associated R&D costs) of at least £8 million are eligible to apply.

Grants will be awarded under Section 7 or 8 of the Industrial Development Act 1982.

Applicants must be:

  • a UK registered company
  • a wholly private sector business
  • a product developer, contract / development manufacturing organisation, or a generics manufacturer

Projects must be:

  • located in the UK
  • be a manufacturing project – this could be for clinical trials or for commercial sale

  • require a specific amount of grant funding to progress. For example, without the specific amount of grant funding the project would:

    • not go ahead
    • go ahead overseas
    • be of a smaller size; or
    • be significantly delayed

The grant request must be calculated from the amount of grant funding that can be evidenced as being the minimum required. Historically, the intervention rate (percentage of grant to capital costs) is 10-20%.

Information for third parties

If you wish to comment on matters relevant to the SAU’s evaluation of the Assessment of Compliance concerning the proposed LSIMF scheme. please send your comments before 5pm on the date stipulated in the timetable above. For guidance on representations relevant to the Assessment of Compliance, see the section on reporting period and transparency in the Operation of the subsidy control functions of the Subsidy Advice Unit.

Please send your submissions to us at LSIMFSubsidy2024@cma.gov.uk, copying the public authority: LSIMF@officeforlifesciences.gov.uk

Please also provide a contact address and explain in what capacity you are making the submission (for example, as an individual or a representative of a business or organisation).

Notes to third parties wishing to make a submission

The SAU will only take your submission into account if it can be shared with the OLS. The SAU will send a copy of your submission to the OLS together with its report. This is to allow the public authority to take account of the submission in its decision as to whether to make or modify the scheme or its assessment. We therefore ask that you provide express consent for your full and unredacted submission to be shared. We also encourage you to share your submission directly with the OLS using the email address provided above.

The SAU may use the information you provide in its published report. Therefore, you should indicate in your submission whether any specified parts of it are commercially confidential. If the SAU wishes to refer in its published report to material identified as confidential, it will contact you in advance.

For further details on confidentiality of third party submissions, see identifying confidential information in the operation of the subsidy control functions of the Subsidy Advice Unit.

Contacts

Published 20 May 2024
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