Notice

Guidance for UK Israel open collaborative competition 2018 EUREKA proposals

Published 19 November 2018

1. Dates and deadlines

Competition opens	19 November 2018
Briefing event for UK applicants	27 November 2018
Final date for UK registration	27 February 2019
Deadline for submission of the full UK application
(including EUREKA application form, finance forms and appendices)	11 March 2019
Decision to applicants	9 August 2019

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

2. 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 are 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:

• submitted applications will be reviewed to make sure that they are both eligible and in scope for the competition
• only applications that meet the eligibility and scope requirements of the competition will be sent for assessment
• 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 approach to build a portfolio of projects that:
  • are high quality
  • target opportunities that benefit both the UK and Israeli economy and/or productivity in a positive way
  • demonstrate sufficient innovation, potential return on investment and degree of technical risk
  • demonstrate value for money, including the potential impact of the project relative to its cost, and the cost of other projects under consideration
• the lead applicant will be notified of the funding decision
• all eligible and in scope applications for the competition will receive assessor feedback

3. 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

The lead applicant must download and complete the EUREKA Network application form on behalf of the consortium. They must email the application form to projects@eurekanetwork.org with the subject line: UK Israel open collaborative competition 2018.

The lead UK applicant must also register with Innovate UK and submit the application form via a secure FTP site.

You will receive an email from Innovate UK acknowledging your registration. Up to 48 hours later you will get a second email containing:

• a username and password for our secure upload facility
• a unique application number
• the Innovate UK cover sheet

3.1 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 following documents from the public download area:

• finance form for this competition.
• monitoring guidelines for exploitation plan requirements
• project plan

3.2 Submit your documents

You must submit the following mandatory documents to the secure site:

• your Innovate UK cover sheet with your unique application number for this competition
• your EUREKA application form
• project finance forms for every UK based business partner in your project
• risk register in PDF format, maximum 2 A4 pages
• exploitation plan in PDF format, maximum 2 A4 pages
• project plan and Gantt chart in PDF format, maximum 2 A4 pages

Your risk register, exploitation plan, project plan and Gantt chart must include details of any dependencies and partnerships with Israeli companies.

3.3 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.

3.4 Assessment

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

3.5 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.

3.6 Feedback

Approximately 4 weeks after you have received your notification email, we will give feedback to all applications that are assessed. The lead applicant can access and download the feedback by signing in to 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 is provided and there will be no further discussion on the application.

4. Innovate UK cover sheet

This sheet will be emailed to you along with your username and password for our secure upload facility and a unique application number. It requests basic information about your project. The project cost and grant requested must be given in euros. The lead organisation must be the same as the lead organisation on the EUREKA application form.

5. Finance form

Each UK business 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.

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