The Strength in Places Fund (SIPF), led by UK Research and Innovation, is a new competitive funding scheme that takes a place-based approach to research and innovation funding, to support significant regional growth. Funding will be allocated in waves to fund collaborative bids from consortia of publicly-funded research organisations, businesses, and local leadership.
Objectives of the fund
The high level aims of the Strength in Places Fund are:
- To support innovation-led relative regional growth by identifying and supporting areas of R&D strengths that are:
- driving clusters of businesses across a range of sizes that have potential to innovate, or to adopt new technologies
- in order that those clusters will become nationally and internationally competitive
- To enhance local collaborations involving research and innovation. Building on the underpinning regional economic impact role of universities, research institutes, Catapults and other R&D facilities (such as Innovation and Knowledge Centres – IKCs); and engaging those businesses at the forefront of delivering economic growth through innovation within the identified economic geography
Who can apply
SIPF will be a competitive fund for collaborative bids between businesses and research organisations, with demonstration of strong engagement with local leadership partners. SIPF will welcome bids that are led by either research organisations or business.
Find out more
An overview of the programme can be found here
Introduction to UK Research and Innovation (UKRI)
UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) is a recently formed body bringing together seven existing research councils, as well as Innovate UK and the Research and Knowledge Exchange functions of the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFC), into one unified body to direct research funding.