Notice

Competition guidance for Newton Fund and EUREKA GlobalStars: affordable health in India

Published 6 August 2018

This notice was withdrawn on 13 February 2019

This competition is no longer open for applications. Search current funding opportunities.

1. Dates and deadlines

Competition opens	13 August
Competition briefing event	22 August
Final date for registration	Midday 27 September 2018
Deadline for submission of the full application (including finance forms, appendices and Je-S forms)	Midday 4 October 2018
Decision to applicants	February 2019

Please read the full competition scope before you make your application.

The project consortium must complete and submit a Eureka project application form to GlobalStars as well completing the Innovate UK application.

2. Funding

There is up to £1 million of funding available from Innovate UK, as part of UK Research and Innovation. This is for research and development projects that tackle the technical challenges described in the brief for this competition.

Total project costs must range in size from £350,000 to £450,000. UK partners can claim a grant of no more than £300,000 per project.

The UK funding comes from the Newton Fund. Applicants must be able to demonstrate that there is a clear economic and societal benefit to India from their proposed project. This is in line with the Newton Fund forming part of the UK government’s official development assistance budget (ODA).

If projects are judged to be non-compliant with ODA, Innovate UK reserves the right to not submit the application for assessment.

Capital usage or equipment: Expenditure on equipment is eligible under this competition. All materials must be directly related and essential to the goals of the project. Equipment funded by and used on the project, which has a value greater than £1 at the project end, must be donated to India in compliance with ODA rules.

Please read our funding rules guidance for more information on the different categories of funding and the rules around our state aid framework.

3. Requirements and eligibility

Application:

• in your application form, please select the primary type of research that you will be doing in the project and calculate the amount of grant you want to claim. This should be in line with the Innovate UK funding rules
• you may be eligible to receive different rates of funding. This depends on the type and size of your organisation
• submissions using the incorrect application form will not be considered eligible
• submissions without complete or missing finance forms will not be considered eligible
• all submission documents must be submitted in the correct file format as explained in this document; any document in an incorrect format will result in the entire application not being sent for assessment
• if an application is unsuccessful, you can use the feedback received to re-apply for the same project once more into another round of this competition or another competition within scope
• if you have been awarded previous grants as the lead or sole company, no new awards will be made if we feel that you have not made a substantial effort to exploit these previous grants. This is detailed in the exploitation plan submitted in the applications for the previous grants. The decision will meet the following criteria:
  • it will be decided by the sector team concerned using evidence from Monitoring Officer reports and other sources which will be documented
  • it will be made by at least 3 sector team members collectively
  • it will be communicated in writing to the company by the Innovation Lead dealing with the new grant application
  • it will not be contestable and Innovate UK will not enter into subsequent correspondence

Project:

• all projects must be led by a UK based business and must collaborate with at least one eligible Indian organisation
• only UK based companies and research organisations are eligible to receive funding from Innovate UK
• for all research organisations, the total level of project participation is set at a maximum of 30% of total UK eligible project costs. If your consortium contains more than one research organisation, this maximum will be shared between them
• we may consider projects outside the ranges described in section 2 but you must email customer support services at support@innovateuk.gov.uk to discuss at least 10 days before the registration deadline to discuss further

Any 1 business can be involved in up to 3 applications to this competition but can only be the lead partner in one application

4. Competition process

For this competition, Innovate UK will use a portfolio approach. This is to make sure that the strategic criteria described in the competition brief, is met for all projects considered to be above the quality threshold. This will be as a result of independent expert assessment. The process will follow these steps:

• all applications must meet the eligibility, scope and ODA requirements of the competition for them to be sent for national and international assessment
• applications must be submitted to the UK, India and EUREKA as well as the Netherlands, Spain and Flanders if there are partners from these countries applying for funding. If national application forms and the EUREKA form have not been submitted by all partners in the consortium then your application will not go for assessment.
• UK applications in scope will be assessed by up to 5 external assessors who are experts in the innovation area identified in your application
• assessors will score applications consistently and in line with scoring matrices. They will provide written feedback for each marked question
• applications will be ranked in descending order. Applications which score over a quality threshold are reviewed against Innovate UK’s strategy to build a portfolio of projects that:
  • are high quality
  • reflect a range as described in the scope and spread of project durations that fit the funding available
  • demonstrate sufficient innovation, potential return on investment and degree of technical risk
  • demonstrate value for money, include the potential impact of the project relative to its cost, and the cost of other projects under consideration
  • demonstrate true collaboration between UK, India and other international partners (if involved)
• Innovate UK’s ranking list will form part of an international selection panel with the ranking lists of all funding bodies involved in this Global Stars call
• the international ranking list will determine which projects will be funded
• the lead applicant will be notified of the funding decision via email

5. How to apply

Before you apply into an Innovate UK competition, it is important to understand the whole application process. The information contained in this guidance is specific to this competition. In addition, please read our general guidance for applicants to give you further information that will help you to complete your application, this includes:

• funding rules (this will help when defining your organisation type)
• project costs
• state aid
• how to submit your application
• categories of research and development
• participation in a project

You will receive an email acknowledgement of your registration followed by a second email up to 48 hours later. The second email will contain a username and password for our secure upload facility along with a unique application number and form.

Application: Once you have received your unique username and password, you can sign in to the secure website. You are then able to access the finance form for this competition from the public download area.

Finance form: Only finance forms named ’Project Finance Form.xls’ will be accepted into this competition. Previous versions of the project finance form will be ineligible.

Submit your documents: You or your lead partner should submit to your FTP site:

• your application form with your unique application number for this competition (mandatory)
• project finance forms for every non-academic UK partner (including the lead organisation) in your project (mandatory)
• Je-S submission pdf output document, confirming a “with council” status for every UK academic partner in your project, if any (mandatory)
• project appendices as pdf documents, labelled correctly as per the appendices guidance in section 10

The consortium must also work together to submit the Eureka application form, the annex and a document containing the scanned signatures of all project partners. Read the guidelines for filling in the application form. Email the completed form, annex and document with signatures to globalstars@eurekanetwork.org by 1 October 2018, 5pm (CET), with the subject line “GlobalStars India Call 2018”.

Scope check: Only applications that meet the eligibility criteria and scope of the competition will be sent for assessment. You will be notified if your application is out of scope with a full explanation as to why. Innovate UK reserves the right to declare applications as out of scope.

Assessment: Once the scope and eligibility checks have been completed, all applications that are both eligible and in scope are sent for assessment.

Notification: We will notify the lead organisation of the outcome of the application by the date stated in the timeline, using the email address provided in the application form.

Feedback: Approximately 4 weeks after you have received your notification email, we will give feedback to all applications that have been assessed. The lead applicant can access and download the feedback by signing into the secure FTP site where you uploaded your application documents. It is the responsibility of the lead to communicate the feedback with the rest of the consortium, if applicable. No additional feedback can be provided and there will be no further discussion on the application.

6. The application form

This section explains the structure of the application form and offers guidance on what to answer in each question.

The structure is as follows:

• application details
• summary of proposed project
• public description of the project
• gateway question: scope
• question 1: need or challenge
• question 2: approach and innovation
• question 3: team and resources
• question 4: market awareness
• question 5: outcomes and route to market
• question 6: Official Development Assistance (ODA) and compliance with the International Development (Gender Equality) Act 2014
• question 7: project management
• question 8: risks
• question 9: additionality
• question 10: costs and value for money
• other funding from public sector bodies
• finance summary table

Please make sure that you upload the final version of your application by the deadline. It is the lead organisation’s responsibility to ensure that you do not upload a blank or incomplete application form. You should also follow these steps:

• you can only use the application form provided. It contains specific information including a unique reference number for your project
• the application form contains specific fields. It is important that you complete each field and submit a fully completed form. Incomplete forms will be considered ineligible and won’t be sent for assessment
• the application form must not be altered, converted or saved as a different version of Microsoft Word
• the space provided in each field of the form is fixed. You must restrict your responses in each of the fields to the space provided. The typeface, font size and colour are predetermined and cannot be changed. Illustrations, graphics and hyperlinks cannot be included in the application form.
• the light grey shaded fields are completed automatically from other information entered on the form, such as the total columns of a table. These cannot be overwritten
• you should be able to see your total answer to the question when looking at the application form in print view. Any text that cannot be seen in this view or when the form is printed will not be assessed
• your answer to the application questions should be no longer than half a page of A4

As part of our objective to stimulate and support UK innovation, we have established a close network of Affinity Partners. This list is made up of organisations that can help Innovate UK fund and support innovative businesses. Our joint aim is to speed up sustainable economic growth for the UK.

In some cases, we may share the public description of your project with other potential funding bodies, for example Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs), agencies of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. These bodies may wish to contact you about providing funding or other support for your proposal.

Field	Guidance
Competition name	This field will show the full name of the Innovate UK competition to which the form applies. You do not need to enter anything here
Document ID	This field is completed automatically
Applicant number	This field is completed automatically and is the reference that you should use on all correspondence (this is the 6 digit number after the dash)
Application details
Project title	Enter the full title of the project
Theme	Please select from the drop down list
Research category	Please select from the drop down list
Project timescales	Enter the estimated start date and its planned duration. These are indicative at this stage and are not guaranteed
UK (Lead ) organisation name	Enter the full registered name of the (lead) organisation for the project. If you are not in a consortium application, these will be your organisation details. Please note that the lead organisation will be the main point of contact between Innovate UK and the project team
UK (Lead) organisation contact details	Enter the full name, postcode, email address and telephone number of the main point of contact between Innovate UK and the project.
Indian (Lead) organisation name	Enter the full registered name of the (lead) organization in India for the project. Please note that the lead organisation will be the main point of contact between Department of BioTechnology (DBT, the Indian funder) and the project team.
Indian (lead) organisation contact details	Enter the full name, postcode, email address and telephone number of the main point of contact between DBT and the project team.
Have any of the project partners previously received Newton funding?	Please select Yes or No. If yes is selected, please confirm which project partner has previously received Newton funding or is in the process of receiving Newton funding. Confirm which delivery partner of the Newton Fund has awarded the funding and under which Newton Fund activity.

Summary of proposed project (not scored)

Please provide a short summary of the content and objectives of the project including what is innovative about it.

This summary is not scored, but provides an introduction to your proposal for the benefit of Innovate UK staff and assessors only. It will not be used for any public dissemination. It should cover, in brief:

• the business need, technological challenge or market opportunity to be targeted
• the approach to be taken and how this will improve on current state-of-the-art
• the difference the project will make to the competitiveness and productivity of the partners involved

Public description of the project (not scored)

To comply with government practice on openness and transparency of public-funded activities, Innovate UK has to publish information relating to funded projects. Please provide a short description of your proposal in a way that will be understandable to the general public. Do not include any commercially confidential information, for example intellectual property or patent details.

Describe your project. Funding will not be provided to successful projects without this.

Gateway question: scope

How does this application align with the specific competition scope?

• all applications must align with the specific competition scope criteria as described in the relevant competition brief
• to demonstrate alignment, you need to show that a clear majority of the project’s objectives and activities are aligned with the specific competition

7. Competition questions

All questions apply to all project partners and are scored out of 10 marks.

Question 1: Need or challenge

What is the business need, technological challenge or market opportunity behind your innovation?

• describe the main motivation for the project; the business need, technological challenge or market opportunity • describe the nearest current state-of-the-art (including those near-market or in development) and its limitations
• describe any work you have already done to respond to this need. For example is the project focused on developing an existing capability or building a new one?
• identify the wider economic, social, environmental, cultural and/or political challenges which are influential in creating the opportunity (for example, incoming regulations). Our Horizons tool can help

Question 2: Approach and innovation

What approach will you take and where will the focus of the innovation be?

• explain how you propose to respond to the need, challenge or opportunity identified
• explain how it will improve on the nearest current state-of-the-art identified
• indicate where the focus of the innovation will be in the project (application of existing technologies in new areas, development of new technologies for existing areas or a totally disruptive approach) and the freedom you have to operate
• explain how this project fits with your current products, service lines or offerings
• explain how it will make you more competitive
• describe the nature of the outputs you expect from the project (for example, report, demonstrator, know-how, new process, product or service design) and how these will take you closer to targeting the need, challenge or opportunity identified

In a separate appendix named ‘AppendixQ2-(application number)’ you can submit in PDF format up to 2 pages to provide a graphic, diagram or image to explain the technology, product or service innovation. It must be legible in 100% zoom.

Question 3: Team and resources

Who is in the project team and what are their roles?

• describe the roles, skills and relevant experience of all members of the project team in relation to the approach you will be taking
• describe the resources, equipment and facilities required for the project and how you will access them
• provide details of any vital external parties, including sub-contractors, who you will need to work with to successfully carry out the project
• (if collaborative) describe the current relationships between the project partners and how these will change as a result of the project
• highlight any gaps in the team that will need to be filled

In a separate appendix named ’AppendixQ3-(application number)’ you can submit in pdf format up to 4 pages to describe the skills and experience of the main people who will be working on the project. It must be legible in 100% zoom.

Question 4: Market awareness

What does the market you are targeting look like?

• specify the markets (domestic and/or international) you will be targeting in the project and any other potential markets
• for the target markets, describe:
  • the size of the target markets for the project outcomes backed up by appropriate references where available
  • the structure and dynamics of the market (such as, customer segmentation), together with predicted growth rates within clear timeframes
  • the main supply or value chains and business models in operation (and any barriers to entry)
  • the current UK position in targeting this market
• for highly innovative projects, where the market may be unexplored, explain:
  • what the route to market could or might be
  • what its size might be
  • how the project will seek to explore the market potential
• for other markets, briefly describe the size and main features of those

Question 5: Outcomes and route to market

How do you propose to grow your business and increase your productivity into the long term as a result of the project?

• describe your current position in the markets and supply or value chains outlined (will you be extending or establishing your market position?)
• describe your target customers and/or end users, and the value proposition to them (why would they use or buy it?)
• describe your route to market
• tell us how you are going to profit from the innovation (increased revenues or cost reduction)
• explain how the innovation will impact your productivity and growth (in the short and long-term)
• describe how you will protect and exploit the outputs of the project, for example through know-how, patenting, designs, changes to business model
• outline your strategy for targeting the other markets identified during or after the project
• for any research organisation activity in the project, outline your plans to disseminate project research outputs over a reasonable timescale
• if you expect to use the results generated from the project in further research activities, describe how

In the “projected growth” tab of each project finance form, for each business and non-academic partner, show your:

• annual turnover
• profit
• exports and research and development (R&D) spend (as a percentage of turnover if appropriate)
• employment (in full time equivalent or FTEs) for your last financial year

Tell us what proportion of these relate to the project area.

Question 6: Official Development Assistance (ODA) and compliance with the International Development (Gender Equality) Act 2014

To be eligible for a Newton Fund grant, applicants must clearly explain and give evidence for why and how their project fits within scope for Official Development Assistance and ODA compliance and the International Development (Gender Equality) Act (GEA). You must complete this question and the additional appendix referenced below.

What beneficial outcomes is the project expected to deliver to those inside and outside of the consortium in India, including economic and social welfare development. Over what timescale?

How is the project likely to contribute to poverty reduction in a way which can reduce inequality between persons of different gender within India, and over what timescale? Proposals will be considered out of scope if they do not:

• show how they aim to ensure sustainable development, and thereby contribute to a reduction in poverty, or
• improve the welfare of people in India, including considering the impact on gender inequality issues

You must give sufficient detail and data on how your project outputs are likely to create impactful positive socio-economic and gender equality outcomes in India. You must explain what those expected outcomes are. Explain your rationale on how the expected outputs will achieve the expected outcomes, and the assumptions you are using to move from outputs to outcomes (the logic model).

Describe the benefits to those inside (project partners) and outside the consortium and make a clear distinction between the 2. Be clear about what stakeholder groups you expect to benefit from this project, and avoid making generic statements.

Please support your ODA eligibility and gender equality justifications by providing further information in the appendix D of which a template is provided within the FTP site. You can use a maximum of 4 sides of A4. It must be legible in 100% zoom.

Please also provide a logic model for your project. Use the template provided in the FTP site, which includes guidance for completion.

Question 7: Project management

How will you manage the project effectively?

• outline the main work packages of the project, indicating the relevant research category and lead partner assigned to each, and the total cost of each one
• describe your approach to project management, identifying any major tools and mechanisms that will be used to ensure a successful project outcome.
• highlight your approach to managing the most innovative aspects of the project
• outline the management reporting lines
• outline your project plan in sufficient detail to identify any links or dependencies between work packages or milestones

In a separate appendix named ’AppendixQ7-(application number)’ you can submit a project plan or Gantt chart up to 2 A4 pages in length in pdf format.

Question 8: Risks

What are the main risks for this project?

• identify the main risks and uncertainties of the project, including the technical, commercial, managerial and environmental risks, highlighting the most significant ones (providing a risk register if appropriate)
• explain how these risks will be mitigated
• list any project inputs on the critical path to completion (such as resources, expertise, data sets)
• is the output likely to be subject to regulatory requirements, certification, ethical issues, etc., if so how will you manage this?

In a separate appendix named ’AppendixQ8-(application number)’ you can submit a risk register of up to 2 A4 pages in length in pdf format. It must be legible in 100% zoom.

Question 9: Additionality

Describe the impact that an injection of public funding would have on this project.

• tell us if this project could go ahead in any form without public funding and if so, the difference the public funding would make (such as faster to market, more partners, reduced risk)
• describe the likely impact of the project on the business of the partners involved
• tell us why you are not able to wholly fund the project from your own resources or other forms of private-sector funding (what would happen if the application is unsuccessful)
• explain how this project would change the nature of R&D activity the partners would undertake (and related spend)

Question 10: Costs and value for money

How much will the project cost and how does it represent value for money for the team and the taxpayer?

• justify the total project cost and the grant being requested in terms of the project goals
• explain how the partners will finance their contributions to the project
• explain how this project represents value for money for you and the taxpayer. How does it compare to what you would spend your money on otherwise?
• justify the balance of costs and grant across the project partners
• justify any sub-contractor costs and why they are critical to the project

Other funding from public sector bodies

If you have included one or more entries in column 7 of the finance summary table (on the following page), please provide:

• the names of the bodies
• the name of the programme or scheme from which the funds are provided
• the fund amounts

8. Finance summary

This table lists the total eligible project costs by organisation. Please note that only certain project costs are eligible for grant funding under UK State Aid rules. See our project costs guidance for information on eligible project costs and how to complete the project finance form.

Column 1 Organisation name	Please provide the full names of the lead organisations (including Indian partner and Dutch, Flemish and Spanish if relevant on separate rows) and any participants in the project consortium (using the organisation names from Companies House or CIN) on separate rows below.
Column 2 Organisation registration Number	UK partner: provide the company registration number from Companies House. UK research organisations: enter your RC number, charitable status, legal entity registration number or similar.
Column 3 Enterprise category	UK partner: Select your enterprise category. SME definition is based on the EU definition. Medium sized: Headcount less than 250: Turnover less than 50 million euros or balance sheet total less than 43 million euros Small: Headcount less than 50: Turnover less than 10 million euros or balance sheet total less than 10 million euros Micro: Headcount less than 10: Turnover less than 2 million euros or balance sheet total less than 2 million euros
Column 4 Postcode where majority of work will be done	Provide the postcode of each organisation participating in the project.
Column 5 Contribution to the project by each organisation (£)/(INR)/(€)	Please list the total contribution to be made to the project by each organisation. For the UK submission, all applicant figures in cols 5-9 must be in £ at the stated exchange rate. For Indianpartners, all figures in cols 5-9 must be in Indian Rupees (INR) at the stated exchange rate. For European partners, all figures in cols 5-9 must be in € at the stated exchange rate.
Column 6 Funding sought from Innovate UK	Please enter the funding sought from Innovate UK for each UK partner. See the guidance on column 5.
Column 6 Funding sought from DBT (India), RTO (the Netherlands), VLAIO (Flanders), CDTI (Spain) value in (INR)/(€)	Please enter the funding sought from the Indian Department of Biotechnology (DBT) for each Indian partner. As well as the funding sought from the European funding agencies. See the guidance on column 5.
Column 7 Other funding from public sector bodies (£)/(INR)/(€)	List any funding for the project from any other public sector bodies which has been applied for separately, and not as part of this competition. Funding from other public sector bodies might include other applications to research councils, other government departments, devolved administrations, other public sector organisations and some charities. The purpose of this column is to provide Innovate UK with information on the total public funding for the project. See the guidance on column 5 above.
Column 8 Total (£)/(INR)/(€)	The total cost of the project for each contributor. This is the sum of columns 5, 6 and 7 and will be entered automatically.
Bottom Row Total (£)/(INR)/(€)	The total of each column will be entered automatically.

Please ensure that you click out of each cell after entering your figures.

9. Finance form

Each UK non-academic organisation in your project must provide a project finance form using the template “Project finance form” which is available on the FTP site. This must be submitted in Excel format with the application form by the lead applicant. Each finance form provides a detailed breakdown on each organisation’s total eligible project costs. Please ensure that all total figures listed in your finance summary table match those stated in the ‘Form status’ tab within the project finance form.

10. Project appendices

You can only include appendices in support of questions 2, 3, 6, 7 and 8 as described in the guidance for those questions. Submission of any additional appendices/documentation not described in this document will result in your application being judged as ineligible and not sent for assessment. Applications submitted with incorrect appendices, with regard to content or naming convention, will be ineligible and not sent for assessment.

In order that assessors can open and read the appendices, each appendix must:

• conform to the maximum length specifications stated for each question
• be submitted in Portable Document Format (pdf)
• be legible at 100% magnification
• display prominently the ‘application number’ as in the filename of the application form for example, ‘AppendixQ2-(application number eg.123456)’

Please do not submit appendices longer than the specified lengths. Assessors are instructed to only read appendices to the lengths specified in the guidance.

11. Additional information

Exchange rate

For the purposes of this competition, the stated exchange rate UK £ to Indian Rupees is: 1 GBP = 90 INR The stated exchange rate UK £ to € is: 1 GBP = 1.12 EUR

Note: this indicative exchange rate must be used in any calculations by applicants at all times during the competition process.

UK Intellectual Property Office (UK IPO)

UK applicants with queries about intellectual property in India can contact the UK’s Intellectual Property Officer in country, details as below. This support is limited to UK applicants only.

Intellectual property and doing business in UK or India.

For queries from UK applicants only related to intellectual property and doing business in India, please contact the UK’s Intellectual Property Officer in India, as below.

Please reference this competition when communicating to the UK IPO representative.

Shilpi Mehta Nanda, Intellectual Property Officer, British High Commission New Dehli Shilpi.Nanda@fco.gov.uk