Health Innovation Funding Opportunities

Featured Funding Opportunities

Investor Partnerships in health technologies, West Yorkshire: Round 1 Deadline: 11 December 2024
UK registered SMEs can apply for grant funding for projects that grow their innovation activities in the health technology cluster in West Yorkshire, alongside private investment from selected investor partners.

Launchpad: life and health sciences, Northern Ireland – Round 2 MFA Deadline: 11 December 2024
UK registered businesses can apply for a share of up to £4.3m for innovation activities in the life and health sciences cluster in Northern Ireland.

Innovate UK innovation loans future economy: Round 18 Deadline: 8 January 2025
UK registered businesses can apply for loans for innovative projects with strong commercial potential to significantly improve the UK economy.

Design Foundations Round 6 Deadline: 15 January 2025
UK registered organisations can apply for a share of up to £2 million for people centred and systemic design projects. These are across a range of themes and innovation areas to influence, inform and de-risk R&D activities.

Mindset extended reality (XR): Digital therapeutics for mental health Deadline: 15 January 2025
UK registered businesses can apply for a share of up to £3.7 million for R&D projects that provide digital therapeutics for mental health solutions. This funding is from Innovate UK.

Innovate UK Smart grants: November 2024 Deadline: 22 January 2025
UK registered organisations can apply for a share of up to £15 million for game changing and commercially viable R&D innovations that can significantly impact the UK economy. This funding is from Innovate UK, part of UK Research and Innovation.

Canada-UK Collaborative R&D Deadline: 16 April 2025
UK registered organisations can apply for a share of up to £3 million for collaboration with Canadian SMEs on joint R&D projects.

General health innovation funding opportunities:

24/59 Behavioural overweight and obesity management interventions that include long term support in achieving and maintaining weight loss in children and young people Deadline: 13 December 2024

DEFENCE AND SECURITY ACCELERATOR (DASA) Deadline: Open call
DASA aims to find and fund exploitable innovation to support UK defence and security quickly and effectively, and support UK prosperity.

BBSRC standard research grant Deadline: Open call

You can apply for research grants at any time in any area within the remit of BBSRC. BBSRC funds research in plants, microbes, animals (including humans), and the tools and technology underpinning biological research from the level of molecules and cells, to tissues, whole organisms, populations and landscapes.

ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL RESEARCH COUNCIL (ESRC) Deadline: Open call

ESRC Research Grant 
If you have an excellent idea for a research project, the ESRC have their Research Grants open call. Awards ranging from £350,000 to £1 million (100 per cent full Economic Cost (fEC)) can be made to eligible institutions to enable individuals or research teams to undertake anything from a standard research project through to a large-scale survey and other infrastructure or methodological development.

INNOVATE UK:
Innovate UK is part of UK Research and Innovation, a non-departmental public body funded by a grant-in-aid from the UK government. 

BIOTECHNOLOGICAL AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES RESEARCH COUNCIL:
Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council, part of UK Research and Innovation, is a non-departmental public body, and is the largest UK public funder of non-medical bioscience. It predominantly funds scientific research institutes and university research departments in the UK.

NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR HEALTH AND CARE RESEARCH:
The National Institute for Health and Care Research is the British government’s major funder of clinical, public health, social care and translational research. Its mission is to “improve the health and wealth of the nation through research”. 

NIHR i4i Launch dates: Product Development Award
i4i Product Development Awards (PDA) support collaborative research and development of medical devices, in vitro diagnostic devices and high-impact patient-focused digital health technologies for use in the NHS or social care system. The expected focus of a PDA is product development required to enable a technology for clinical use or use in social care and/or the clinical development of a laboratory-validated technology or intervention. The research proposals may address any area of unmet need. Projects must have a clear pathway towards adoption and commercialisation. 
Product Development Award Call 29: 10 October 2024 / Deadline: 5th December 2024

24/59 Behavioural overweight and obesity management interventions that include long term support in achieving and maintaining weight loss in children and young people. Deadline: 13 December 2024. 

DEFENCE AND SECURITY ACCELERATOR (DASA) Deadline: Open call
DASA aims to find and fund exploitable innovation to support UK defence and security quickly and effectively, and support UK prosperity. 

Open Competition
The Open Call is one of the funding competition mechanisms DASA uses to find proposals that address challenges faced by government stakeholders. It gives bidders the opportunity to present their ideas to defence and security stakeholders at any time, without waiting for a relevant Themed Competition.

MEDICAL RESEARCH COUNCIL (MRC)
The Medical Research Council (MRC) improves the health of people in the UK – and around the world – by supporting excellent science and training the very best scientists.

ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL RESEARCH COUNCIL (ESRC)Deadline: Open call

ESRC Research Grant
If you have an excellent idea for a research project, the ESRC have their Research Grants open call. Awards ranging from £350,000 to £1 million (100 per cent full Economic Cost (fEC)) can be made to eligible institutions to enable individuals or research teams to undertake anything from a standard research project through to a large-scale survey and other infrastructure or methodological development.

NC3RS:
The NC3RS is a UK-based scientific organisation dedicated to helping the research community worldwide to replace, reduce and refine the use of animals for medical testing.

CRACK IT challenges 
Funding of £4M is available through the 2023 CRACK IT Challenges competition* to solve four Challenges, providing academics and SMEs based in the UK and Europe** with the opportunity to deliver scientific and 3Rs benefits through the development and commercialisation of 3Rs products and services that are tailored to end-user needs.

Trusts and Charities

The Health Foundation (HF)
HF’s aim is a healthier population, supported by high quality health care that can be equitably accessed. HF learns what works to make people’s lives healthier and improve the health care system. From giving grants to those working at the front line to carrying out research and policy analysis, they shine a light on how to make successful change happen.

The British Heart Foundation (BHF)
BHF provide personal support for clinical and non-clinical cardiovascular researchers at all stages of their career. They also provide grants for short and long term research projects, essential infrastructure and strategic initiatives.

Association of Medical Research Charities
Over 30 years ago a small, diverse group of medical research charities form the Association of Medical Research Charities (AMRC) to unite the sector and provide it with a leading voice. Since then their membership has grown to over 140 charities. In 2018, these charities invested £1.3 billion in medical research.

Other UK Government, Seed Funds & Loans

The British Business Bank Deadline: Open

BBB are a government-owned business development bank dedicated to making finance markets work better for smaller businesses. Whether you’re looking for finance to start a business, grow to the next level, or stay ahead of the competition, they say that they can deliver greater volume and choice of finance.

Small Business Research Initiative (SBRI) funding. General ‘collection’ of news and funds

Information about SBRI for businesses and public sector organisations that might want to use the scheme.

UK Innovation & Science Seed Fund Deadline: Open

The UK Innovation & Science Seed Fund (formerly known as The Rainbow Seed Fund) is a £27.1m early-stage venture capital fund building and growing technology companies stemming from the UK’s research base.

Creative England Investments Deadline: Open

Creative England is supporting SMEs by providing competitive loans to digital businesses in order to make their growth plans a reality. The investments on offer are intended to fuel this fast-growing sector by financing business expansion and new products, leading to the creation of new high-quality jobs and Intellectual Property (IP). Loans from £50,000 – £250,000 are available with repayment terms ranging from 3-36 months. Interest rates range from 5% to 10%, depending on the risk profile of the applicant. This includes companies from within the digital healthcare sector.

International Grants

Global Innovation Fund Applications: Open
GIF focuses on solutions that have the potential to address an important development problem more effectively than existing approaches and can come from anyone, anywhere. They seek out innovations they believe have the greatest potential to improve the lives of millions of people living in poverty.

The EIC Accelerator: Open Competition (Grants only)
The EIC Accelerator supports individual Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs), in particular, Startups and spinout companies to develop and scale up game-changing innovations. 

Other international funds of interest:

The Global Challenges Research Fund
The Newton Fund