Growing Kent and Medway: prototyping and demonstrator fund

The lead organisation may be based outside of the Kent and Medway (K&M) area but you must collaborate with at least one organisation in the K&M area. To lead a project your organisation must:

• be a UK registered business of any size
• be able to evidence that you are an established business, including sole traders and partnerships
• have a UK bank account
• collaborate with other UK registered businesses, research organisations, public sector organisations or charities
• include a minimum of 2 organisations in the consortium
• intend to exploit the results from or in the K&M area

To collaborate with the lead, your organisation must be a UK based grower, producer, food and drink manufacturer or one of the following UK registered:

• business of any size
• academic institution
• charity
• not for profit organisation
• public sector organisation
• research organisation (RO)
• research and technology organisation (RTO)

Collaborations with research organisations in the K&M area are encouraged but not mandatory. These organisations are:

• NIAB
• University of Greenwich
• University of Kent
• Canterbury Christ Church University

Collaborations with research organisations from outside the K&M area are not permitted in this competition.

A business can only lead on one application but can be included as a collaborator in two further applications. A business or organisation that is not leading a project can collaborate on any number of applications within this competition.

Any awards given to primary agricultural producers are subject to the green box exemption under the WTO Agreement on Agriculture. Please see further guidance on green box subsidies here: WTO Guidance for support in Agriculture.

Applicants receiving this type of support must ensure that there is minimal to no distortion of trade and comply with the requirements of Annex 2 of the Agriculture Agreement.

Your project must:

• have a total grant funding request between £50,000 and £150,000
• start from 1 May 2024
• end by 30 September 2025
• last up to 12 months
• carry out at least 60% of its project work in the Kent and Medway (K&M) area
• intend to exploit the results from or in the K&M area

The aim of this competition is to support business focused innovative technology development with emphasis on industrial prototyping and demonstration. The technologies developed in these projects must aim to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, improve sustainability, or deliver improved productivity in horticultural and food production systems.

The competition focuses on:

• horticultural production including the production of novel, high value compounds from plants
• fresh produce packaging
• food and drink processing and manufacturing

Your proposal must focus on innovative technology development and:

• design, develop, test and deploy a technology
• conduct a technical and economic assessment

We want to fund real world prototypes or demonstrators of innovative technologies in an operational setting in the horticultural food and drink production sector.

Your proposal must demonstrate the potential to positively impact on the economy of the Kent and Medway (K&M) area.

Your project must:

• provide solutions that tackle new or emerging needs
• demonstrate a realistic potential to support business growth, scale-up, and job creation
• deliver benefit to the region as well as further afield
• underpin a full commercial and operational technology deployment after September 2025, by delivering a meaningful operational demonstration in real world conditions for at least two weeks before 30 November 2025
• achieve market potential through a clear strategy for commercialising the technology and the product

Your demonstration must include the technology being used in a representative real world operational environment for a period of at least two weeks.

There is no fixed definition of how projects must undertake their demonstration and use this minimum two week period. The demonstration will depend on your project, technology and what is required to prove its performance. We strongly encourage projects to utilise this minimum two week period fully and to gather as much performance data as possible.

Your application must clearly state how you plan to undertake the demonstration, including how much time in operational use you currently expect and why this is appropriate for your project. During the demonstration you must validate the technology operation for the use case or target market and capture data on the performance.

At the end of your real-world operational demonstration project, you must:

• produce a clear, detailed and costed plan to fully scale and enter the solution into UK and global markets over the next 3 years, including your technical approach, objectives and business case
• detail your plan for compliance with regulation and how you will work with relevant regulatory bodies for novel technologies
• quantify the economic impacts in the future, including citing usage data from the demonstration period
• explain your understanding of any remaining barriers to full market adoption
• share your findings with GKM and Innovate UK in your end of project report
• work with GKM to produce a plan for disseminating the results of your demonstration project and knowledge sharing with relevant stakeholders and industry

Your project must focus on one or more of the following:

• moving towards net zero carbon emissions targets
• minimising waste and maximising recycling
• improving resource use efficiency and sustainability
• increasing productivity
• resilient food production, for example: supply chain resilience, nutritional security
• addressing current and future labour or skills shortages, supply or demand driven, within the K&M agri-food sector

Innovate UK will hold an online briefing event at 11:30am on Wednesday 22 November: click here for the joining link.

If you would like help to find a project partner, contact Innovate UK KTN’s Agrifood team.