Business Innovation Fund

Funding and support for small to medium sized enterprises to accelerate innovation.

Our mission is to continually encourage businesses to invest in innovation.

We want to help businesses, either individually or in collaboration with research institutes, find new ways to create an even more efficient, creative and sustainable future. The Business Innovation Fund helps businesses bring new products, services and processes to market.

Support available

The Business Innovation Fund supports businesses from a wide range of sectors to help develop innovative projects and products. Our support includes:

Grants of £20,000 or £50,000 to help progress research and development (R&D) activity.
Tailored support to help beneficiary companies develop an R&D roadmap.
Connection with our region’s leading research organisations.

Eligibility criteria

Businesses are eligible if they are:

Based in the West of England – Bath & North East Somerset, Bristol, North Somerset or South Gloucestershire
Able to provide match funding towards the cost of the project
A small or medium sized enterprise (SME) with a staff headcount lower than 250

How to apply

Applications for the Business Innovation Fund are currently closed.
To find out more about support available for small-medium sized enterprises (SMEs) please contact the West of England Growth Hub, our dedicated business support service.

Visit Growth Hub

Funding

The Business Innovation Fund is supported with £1,451,825 of funding from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), which is part of the European Structural and Investment Funds 2014-2020. The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government is the Managing Authority for ERDF. Established by the European Union, the ERDF helps local areas stimulate economic development by investing in project which will support innovation, business, create jobs and delivery local community regeneration.