Notice

Annex 9 - North Star Metric information

Updated 7 November 2023

This notice was withdrawn on 23 May 2024

This call has closed.

1. What is the North Star Metric?

The North Star Metric is a quantitative metric which measure the level of revenue and investment in the UK Space Sector which can be attributed to UK Space Agency supported. Data is gathered as an agreed requirement of UK Space Agency grants and contracts from the recipients of those grants and contracts.

2. Why is this data being collected?

The UK Space Agency works to ensure that our investment in space brings about real benefit to the UK and its people.

Consistent monitoring and evaluation of our programmes is vital so we understand how well we are delivering the UK Space Agency’s objectives. This in turn helps us to ensure we are delivering the National Space Strategy, and informs how we prioritise our resource, select the projects we invest in, and make the case for future public spending on space.

We therefore require, as a condition of funding, that all recipients report the benefits they receive as a result.

The data allows the agency to show the benefits of the UK Space Sector and UK Space Agency spending, these benefits justify UK Space Agency spending.

3. What data will be collected?

Reporting will primarily involve four key elements:

• Total income
• Total Internal Investment
• Total Private Investment
• Additional detail on funding sources as appropriate

This information will be collected via a simple table below. Please note that data will not be shared with other companies and that it will be held securely in an anonymised form so that you cannot be directly identified.

Grant number	Delivery priority (to be filled out by UKSA programme manager)	Quarter	Total funding value (£)	Amount of match funding provided as a condition of UKSA funding (total value £)	Additional revenue generated from goods and services as a result of UKSA support (total value £)	Private investment generated as a result of UKSA support (total value £)	Source of Additional Investment: Foreign/Domestic	Internal Investment of funds made as a result of UKSA support (total value £)	Additional jobs created as a result of funding received	Has this programme received any other support from the UK Space Agency?	Has this Grant or Contract had an additional impact on investment which cannot be quantified?

Any Additional benefits may also be reported through open text response.

4. How will the data be collected?

When beginning the grant or contract recipients will be asked to provide name and contact details of the person in your organisation who will be responsible for providing this information.

The data is to be reported at regular grant or contract management meetings on no less than every 6 months from the start of the activity covered by this agreement.

At the end of the grant or contract period the grant manager will decide a reasonable date with the grant or contract recipient at which time further data collection will be reasonable. Data will be required for at least 5 years after the completion of the activity covered by this agreement.

Where the length of benefit realisation would be longer than 5 years, the UK Space Agency may require an extended reporting period. This is to ensure that we are capturing the full benefits of an activity that has a long time period before those benefits are realised. Where this is the case the UK Space Agency will agree with grant recipients beforehand at the time at which a further request for information is sensible.

5. How will data privacy be maintained?

The information provided will only be used by the UK Space Agency and not shared with any other parties. Aggregate information may be presented more widely but this will be fully anonymised and not be attributable to any individual organisation.

In addition, this information is being used to assess the Agency’s impact on the space sector and is not intended to be used as a way to evaluate how the grant is being managed.

6. Definitions of the data to be collected

The below table contains definitions for the data we are looking to collect. Information should be reported both on financial information from the grant or recipients own company but also, if know, other companies who may have benefited from the grant or contract for example spinout companies that have been able to take advantaged of a new technological development.

Direct benefits should always be reported. Follow-on or spillover benefits should also be reported where there is strong evidence that the spillover benefit would not have occurred in the absence of UK Space Agency funding and is attributable to the grant or contract.

Term	Definition
Private Investment	Money invested by companies, individuals, or financial organisations through the following vehicles: equity, grant, prize, debt or alternative finance sources – excluding funding provided by UK Space Agency directly or via the European Space Agency. The source of the investment can be either foreign or domestic.
Internal Investment	Investment within a company, or from a parent company to its subsidiary, to cover R&D, capital expenditures and other non-capital expenditures such development of intellectual property.
Total Income	Additional Income generated from creation of goods and services, as a result of the specified grant or contract. In the longer term this may also include income generated from royalties and licenses.

7. Attribution to UK Space Agency support

Data should only be reported where it could be reasonably stated that the revenue and/or investment in question would not have occurred without the UK Space Agency’s funding. Where the revenue and/or investment may have only been partially realised in the absence of the UK Space Agency’s funding, best efforts should be made to estimate the proportion of contract revenue and/or investment which can have been said to have occurred as a result.

8. Examples of information that should be reported

Private Investment

• Equity investment from a venture capital fund which can be attributed to the development of a new technology funded by the grant or programme
• Awarding of a grant from non-government organisations to further develop an idea which was initially funded by the grant or contract
• Foreign direct investment that can be attributed to a company experiencing growth as a direct result of receiving the UK Space Agency grant or contract

Internal Investment

• A parent company diverting funds toward the company to aid in the delivery of the programme originated by the grant or contract
• The purchase of large capital equipment to further research initially aided by the grant or contract
• Investment of R&D funds within the company to exploit and idea initially proposed as part of the grant or contract programme

Total Income

• Direct sales of any good or services which have been developed by grant or contract funding
• Income of spinout companies which have been established using a technology developed by the grant or contract funding
• Total Income of sub-sectors of the space market which have been newly developed as a result of the grant or contract funding
• Partial attribution of the revenue received from a future government contract which would not have been won without the development of a technology developed as part of the grant or contract programme

Additional Impact on Investment that cannot be quantified

• A qualitative description of the investment benefit generated from grants which have a negligible direct impact on investment, but these grants are critical to compliment company technology strategies
• A description of how the human capital improvements brought about by the grant or contract would lead to a more highly skilled workforce attracting investment in the UK space industry from foreign investors.
• An assessment of how a technology developed by the grant has led to wider developments in the technological ecosystem which have generated their own investments and revenue.

9. Examples of information that should not be reported

Private Investment

• Grant funding received from the UK Space Agency – the Agency does not measure it’s grants success by the awarding of further grant in the future
• Full attribution of equity investment that can only be partially attributed to the grant or contract – if a grant or contract contributed to but is not the direct cause of receiving the investment then best efforts should be made to state the exact contribution of the grant or contract.

Internal Investment

• Match funding invested as a requirement of the grant – this information should be reported but in the separate field provided
• Funds redirect to divisions within organisations which in truth would have gone ahead without the grant or contract funding – if the grant or contract is part of a wider programme or division which receives additional funding this should only be counted if there is strong evidence these funds would not have been reallocated without the grant or contract being received

Total Income

• Grant or prize funding received from government or non-government organisations – this is considered private investment
• The Value of the grant or contract itself – this should be reported in the separate field provided

Additional Impact on Investment that cannot be quantified

• Qualitative assessment of benefits that can reasonably be quantified – this field is a compliment to the other information provided and not a replacement

If you have any specific questions on this requirement, please contact the UK Space Agency programme manager or named UK Space Agency contact.