Notice

Regulators’ Pioneer Fund: competition brief

Published 20 May 2021

This notice was withdrawn on 16 September 2021

This round of the Regulators’ Pioneer Fund is now closed: see a list of the projects selected for this round.

Competition overview

UK regulators and local authorities can apply to the £3 million Regulators’ Pioneer Fund (RPF) with initiatives that help businesses bring innovative products and services to market.

This is a new round of the Regulators’ Pioneer Fund. The first round invested up to £10 million in 14 regulator-led projects during 2018-20 to stimulate innovation in their sectors.

The competition opens at noon, 20 May 2021.

The competition closes at noon, 15 July 2021.

Description of project requirements

The Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (BEIS) will invest up to £3 million for regulator-led projects of at least 6 months which must end by 31 March 2022.

The competition’s aim is to help keep the UK at the forefront of regulatory thinking and experimentation. The fund will sponsor projects led by regulators or local authorities which aim to create a UK regulatory environment that encourages business innovation and investment.

Your project must be innovative and reflect a research, learning and experimentation approach to regulation.

Project size

Your project’s total grant funding can be up to £200,000. Projects must end by 31 March 2022 and must run for at least 6 months.

Eligibility

Eligibility criteria

To be eligible for funding you must be a body which meets the following three criteria:

• exercises a ‘regulatory function’, as defined in section 32(2)-(4) of the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Act 2006
• performs that regulatory function in Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, England or across the UK
• is subject to and follows the guidance in HM Treasury’s Managing Public Money handbook, or, if not subject to that guidance, is able to demonstrate compliance with Managing Public Money principles with respect to any funding received from the RPF.

Only the regulator or local authority leading and sponsoring a project may submit an application and claim funding. They are the lead applicant.

Subject to subsidy control requirements (see below), the lead applicant may involve domestic and/or international partners (such as businesses, industry bodies, civil society groups, other regulators or academic institutions) in their proposed project where such participation is relevant to the purpose of their project and would be expected to improve or enhance the outcomes sought. However, the lead applicant will remain fully responsible themselves for the delivery of their project. BEIS will not organise or mediate working arrangements or agreements between bodies participating in a project.

Regulators and local authorities must meet public sector procurement rules in relation to any subcontractors they use in their RPF projects, or if not subject to those requirements, must be able to demonstrate compliance with public sector procurement principles with respect to any funding received from the RPF.

The lead applicant will have overall accountability for the use of all project funding (including for sub-contracted goods and services) in line with Managing Public Money principles.

Multiple applications

Regulators and local authorities are limited to being the lead applicant on 3 applications, but there is no limit to the number of applications in which a regulator or local authority can be a partner.

Resubmissions

If your proposal was successful in the first round of the RPF which ran 2018 to 2020, you may not submit the same proposal in this competition and any proposal you submit this time should be materially different from any proposal that received funding from the first round of the RPF.

If you have any queries about your organisation’s eligibility or your proposal, please email regulators.pioneerfund@beis.gov.uk.

Funding

Funding type

Grant

Funding criteria

We have allocated up to £3 million to fund projects in this competition. Funding will be available from August 2021 to 31 March 2022, by which date projects must end.

You can apply for up to £200,000 in grant funding. This limit includes funds that would be paid or passed on to your collaborators or partners by you on a sub-contract basis. Funding can only be used for non-commercial activities (see the subsidy control section below for further detail). You can usually recover the VAT paid on goods and services purchased for use in your business by submitting a VAT return. VAT that can be recovered is not an eligible cost.

You should commit your own resources to the project wherever possible and describe this in your application. This could include matched funding by your organisation to finance some of the activities or spend needed for your project as well as staffing resource and equipment.

You must outline plans to ensure that your project has lasting benefits and/or impacts beyond the lifetime of the RPF-funded activity.

Subsidy control

Applicants will need to consider possible subsidy implications. Any UK organisation claiming RPF funding must be eligible to receive a subsidy at the time we confirm you will be awarded funding. If you are unsure, please take legal advice. It is your responsibility to make sure that your organisation is eligible to receive subsidies.

Some activities carried out by or on behalf of the regulator or local authority in relation to its statutory obligations or functions as a regulator / local authority may be considered an economic activity, therefore may fall within subsidy control requirements. Any aid granted for non-economic activities should not be used to cross-subsidise commercial activities.

Projects we will not fund

We will not fund projects that:

• are designed to enhance a regulator’s or local authority’s own performance without demonstrating significant positive benefits to businesses or innovators
• would be reliant on ongoing government funding commitments beyond the duration of the project to deliver economic benefits;
• do not satisfy the essential requirements set out in this document
• do not have:
  • senior sponsorship at the applicant’s organisation
  • agreement that the findings, learnings and/or conclusions from the project will be shared with BEIS to facilitate the evaluation of the RPF policy measure as required by HM Treasury

Your proposal

We want to help keep the UK at the forefront of regulatory thinking and experimentation. The RPF will sponsor projects led by regulators or local authorities which aim to create a UK regulatory environment that encourages business innovation and investment. We are looking for project proposals that are ambitious, collaborative and address one or more of the UK government’s priorities.

Ambitious

Your project proposal should:

• enable major improvements in a particular sector, for example, changes in approach by a single regulator to enable innovative new products and services to come to market, such as through the use of live-testing environments and/or the development of dedicated support measures for innovators
• demonstrate value for money
• show potential for lasting benefits beyond the duration of the project with plans to scale up and spread best practice

Collaborative

Your project proposal should:

• bring multiple regulators and/or local authorities together to explore ‘cross-cutting’ issues of mutual interest and/or provide a more joined-up, efficient and effective service to business. For example, multi-regulator projects that can support industries, or emerging/growing business activities which cross regulatory boundaries, such as the development of forums or a multi-agency advice service
• feature partnerships that include businesses, industry bodies, civil society groups, regulators and academia – as well as regulators and local authorities in other jurisdictions and/or international standard-setting organisations

Address one or more of the UK government’s priorities

Your project proposal should address one of more of the UK government’s priorities:

• reducing regulatory burdens on business, particularly in relation to starting up and growing in the UK, and reducing the barriers to market entry and trade in innovative products and services
• improving businesses’ experience of and confidence in regulation in order to encourage longer-term investment in the UK
• tackling the long term poor productivity growth in the UK economy
• levelling up the UK by tackling geographic, socio-economic and/or other inequalities
• tackling climate change
• seizing opportunities arising from the UK’s exit from the EU

**Your project must be innovative and reflect a research, learning and experimentation approach to regulation

It must:

Be novel:

• the project must be aimed at finding, acquiring and disseminating new knowledge towards a specific aim or objective

Be creative:

• the project must be based on a new idea or concept with the object of improving on existing knowledge

Be systematic:

• the project should be systematically performed and conducted, with the process and outcomes documented
• a report summarising the project and the lessons learned must be published with key insights communicated to relevant stakeholders

Be able to be reproduced:

• your project should lead to results that have the potential to be reproduced

You must:

• adopt a systematic approach to delivery with clear plans for the monitoring and evaluation of progress and results, with adequate data capture and documentation of the process and outcomes. You should strongly consider identifying and using Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) to evaluate your work;
• provide BEIS with full access to data on the impact of your RPF-funded work to enable the capture of learning and best practice;
• have approval from BEIS to publicise, carry out promotional activities or disseminate information in relation to your RPF-funded work;
• publish a report summarising your project and the lessons learned with key insights communicated to relevant stakeholders; and
• have (i) senior sponsorship at the applicant’s organisation and (ii) agreement that the findings and learnings/conclusions from the project will be shared with BEIS to facilitate the evaluation of the RPF policy measure as required by HM Treasury

Project types

The types of proposals we would encourage are those for:

• projects that harness new thinking, new methods and/or new technological approaches in order to improve regulatory delivery and performance, benefitting innovators and businesses
• short research and development projects that generate new learning by exploring:
  • solutions for a regulatory issue faced by innovators or businesses; or
  • proactive measures to better support innovators or businesses
• a short trial or pilot study of a new initiative to change a regulatory approach that can enhance support for innovators or businesses

How to apply

Download the application form for the RPF competition.

Send your completed application form to regulators.pioneerfund@beis.gov.uk.

The application is split into 3 sections:

• application details
• application questions
• project financial information

Application details

The lead applicant must complete this section. Give your project’s title, start date and duration.

Project summary

Describe your project briefly and be clear about what makes it an innovative and an innovation-supporting venture. Set out the challenge you wish to tackle and what the intended gains and learnings from your project will be and for whom. Explain how your proposed project reflects the purpose of the RPF programme. Your summary should be accessible and clear to a person who is not a specialist in your sector or field. List any organisations you have identified as partners or subcontractors. Your answer may be up to 400 words long. If your proposal does not reflect the eligibility criteria of the RPF programme, it will be rejected and not be sent for assessment. We will provide feedback.

Public description

Describe your project in detail, and in a way that you would be prepared to see published. Do not include information that is commercially sensitive or confidential to your organisation. If your proposal is awarded funding, we will publish this description. This could happen before the start of your project. Your answer may be up to 250 words long.

Application questions

Your answers to these questions will be scored by assessors. You will receive feedback on your application. Your answer to each question may be up to 300 words long. Do not include any URLs in your answers. Please provide clear, jargon-free, well-structured and well-reasoned answers.

Question 1: Rationale or demand (20 marks)

What is the problem or challenge for business that your proposal addresses? What evidence is there of demand for the change in regulatory approach?

Describe or explain:

• the main motivation for the project, including the problem or challenge faced by businesses, the economic context, technological challenge and/or market opportunity
• the evidence, whether from the UK or overseas, that there is a demand for a change in regulatory approach
• any work you have already done to understand the issue, respond to this need, explaining whether your project will develop an existing capability or build a new one

Question 2: Alignment (20 marks)

How is the proposal aligned to your organisation’s priorities and/or the priorities of the UK government?

Describe or explain:

• the wider economic, social, environmental, cultural or political challenges which are influential in creating the opportunity, such as incoming regulations
• which of the UK government priorities this proposal relates to (where relevant) or which of your organisation’s priorities
• how the proposal will help businesses and innovators to bring innovative products and services to market
• the potential for the project to contribute to addressing the UK government’s priorities listed in this document

Question 3: Team and resources (20 marks)

What are the resources, equipment and facilities needed for your project and how will you provide or access them?

Describe or explain:

• the details of any vital external partners, including sub-contractors, who you will need to work with to successfully carry out the project
• (if your project is collaborative) the current relationships between project partners, senior buy-in for your proposal among project partners and how the working relationship for this project will be run/managed
• any roles you will need to recruit for or resources you will need to acquire to deliver the project successfully
• who in your organisation will be the Senior Responsible Owner (SRO) for this project – their name and designation

Question 4: Governance and delivery (20 marks)

How will you manage the project effectively, ensuring timely progress, transparent reporting (including financial) and robust governance? For this question you may also submit a project plan, no more than one side of A4, alongside your application form.

Describe or explain:

• how you will respond to the need, challenge or opportunity identified.
• the main work packages of the project
• the nature of the outputs you expect from the project
• your project plan in enough detail to identify any links or dependencies between work packages or milestones
• your approach to project management, identifying any tools and mechanisms you will use to get a successful and innovative project outcome
• describe how you will monitor and evaluate your project including any key performance indicators you plan to implement
• the main risks and uncertainties of the project, including the technical, commercial, managerial, legal, privacy/data protection and environmental risks
• how you will mitigate these risks
• how your organisation’s internal governance will support your project

Question 5: Added value (10 marks)

How will an injection of public funding by the RPF add value for the regulator or local authority?

Describe or explain:

• how your proposal differs from your existing regulatory activities
• the potential for your project to create positive cultural, systemic or institutional change in your organisation
• if this project could go ahead in any form without RPF funding, and, if so, the difference the public funding would make
• why you are not able to wholly fund the project from your own organisation’s resources or other sources of funding, and what would happen if the application is unsuccessful
• what would constitute success for your project, including what metrics and indicators you would use to measure the project’s impact
• the potential to scale up and spread best practice from your project to other regulators, including, where appropriate, internationally, beyond the duration of the project

Question 6: Value for money (10 marks)

How does your proposal offer society and the economy value for money?

Describe or explain:

• how this project represents value for money
• what costs, if any, that you anticipate your project’s outcomes will remove from business
• any sub-contractor costs and why they are critical to the project
• how the project will deliver the greatest possible benefit for the RPF’s money

Project financial information

Please provide a monthly breakdown of your anticipated project costs for the length of the project. You should set out clearly administrative costs, costs associated with training, patent filing, subcontracting, labour and/or materials as applicable. Each organisation/partner/subcontractor in your project should complete their own project costs. Please include information on the matched funding your organisation will provide for your project.

Process after application

Only applications that meet the eligibility criteria will be sent for assessment. You will be notified if your application is out of scope with feedback.

Following an assessment of proposals with respect to the criteria set out, an awarding panel will make the final decision on funding. We aim to notify applicants about the awarding panel’s decision by August 2021.

Successful projects will be required to work with BEIS’s independent evaluation partner to participate in the evaluation of the programme. This could include being contacted at intervals throughout the project, providing project data and participating in interviews and/or surveys. Further information on the evaluation of the programme will be provided if your application for funding is successful.

You will be expected to report on your progress and financial spend to BEIS regularly.

If you require further information, please email regulators.pioneerfund@beis.gov.uk.