Notice

Competition guidance: integrated innovation for nuclear decommissioning

Updated 19 April 2017

This notice was withdrawn on 21 September 2017

This competition is no longer open. Search current funding opportunities.

1. Dates and deadlines

Competition opens	30 January 2017
Competition briefing event	14 February 2017
Final date for registration	12:00pm midday 19 April 2017
Submission of the full application (including appendices)	12:00pm midday 26 April 2017
Decision to applicants	16 June 2017
Contracts awarded	July 2017
Feedback provided	July 2017

Please read the full competition scope before you make your application. You should also read the associated documents listed in Section 7.1 which will be available after you register for the competition.

2. Funding

There is up to £3 million of funding available from Innovate UK and the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority. This is for projects that tackle the technical challenges described in the brief for this competition.

This is divided across 2 phases:

• up to £400,000 for phase 1
• up to £2.6 million for phase 2

2.1 Phase 1

In phase 1, you will produce a detailed technology plan and business case. During phase 1 you may also carry out work that shows your idea is technically feasible (eg laboratory scale experiments). Projects can range in size up to a total cost of £50,000. Projects can last up to 3 months. You must complete and report on phase 1 projects by 31 November 2017.

2.2 Phase 2

Phase 2 is only open to applicants that have successfully completed phase 1. The outputs of successful phase 1 projects form the basis of the phase 2 project. We will take the most promising projects from phase 1 into phase 2, subject to assessment and budget constraints.

In phase 2, you will develop and demonstrate an integrated system based on your phase 1 technology and business plan. Projects can range in size up to a total cost of £1.5 million. We will consider funding larger projects, but you should inform us in advance if you wish to submit an application worth more than £1.5m. You must complete phase 2 projects by 30 September 2019.

This is an SBRI competition and applicants can receive up to 100% funding of their eligible costs for this competition.

3. How to apply

Before you apply into an Innovate UK competition, it is important to understand the whole application process. The information below is specific to this competition. In addition, please read Innovate UK’s general guidance for applicants which will give you information on the general application process. Please note however that the eligibility and the funding rules differ for SBRI competitions.

You must register for the competition when it opens. You will receive an email acknowledgement of your registration followed by a second email up to 48 hours later. The second email will contain a username and password for our secure upload facility along with a unique application form and number.

Application: Once you have received your unique username and password, you can sign into the secure website to access additional documentation for this competition.

Appendices must conform to the guidance for this specific competition. Appendices which do not follow the guidance will result in ineligible applications that will not be sent for assessment.

Submit your documents: The lead contractor should submit:

• your application form with your unique application number for this competition
• project appendices as pdf documents, labelled with your application number

Assessment: Once the competition submission deadline is reached, your application is sent for assessment. Your application will be assessed by up to 5 selected experts and scored based on the criteria given in the Invitation to Tender Document.

We reserve the right to:

• invite applicants to attend an interview prior to awarding phase 2 contracts
• adopt a portfolio approach to ensure projects fully cover the required scope and reflect the potential for short, medium and long-term return on investment for the applicants and the UK economy
• request that projects consider working together where there are clear benefits for the outcome of the competition and the applicants
• award no contracts if applications are of insufficient quality or fail to meet the scope of the competition

Notification: We will notify you of the outcome of your application on the date stated in the timeline.

Feedback: We will give feedback to successful and unsuccessful applicants approximately 4 weeks after you have been notified of the decision. You can access the feedback by signing into the secure website where you uploaded your application documents. No additional feedback can be provided and there will be no further discussion on the application.

4. The application form

This section explains the structure of the application form and offers guidance on what to answer in each question.

The structure is as follows:

• application details (mandatory)
• title and abstract for publication (mandatory)
• competition questions (mandatory)
  • question 1: Approach and Innovation (scored)
  • question 2: Team and Resources (scored)
  • question 3: Planning, risks and management (scored)
  • question 4: Route to market and commercialisation (scored)
  • question 5: Finance and value for money (scored)
• project appendices (mandatory)
• declarations (mandatory)

Please make sure that you upload the final version of your application by the deadline. It is your responsibility to make sure that you do not upload a blank or incomplete application form.

• you can only use the application form provided. It contains specific information including a unique reference number for your project
• the application form contains specific fields. It is important that you complete each field and submit a fully completed form. Incomplete forms will be rejected
• the application form must not be altered, converted or saved as a different version of Microsoft Word
• the space provided in each field of the form is fixed. You must restrict your responses in each of the fields to the space provided. The typeface, font size and colour are predetermined and cannot be changed. Illustrations and graphics cannot be included in the application form. Please check your completed application form in print layout as any text that can’t be seen in this view or when the form is printed will not be assessed
• the light grey shaded fields are completed automatically from other information entered on the form, such as the total columns of a table. These cannot be overwritten

Field	Guidance
Competition name	This field will show the full name of the Innovate UK competition to which the form applies. You do not need to enter anything here.
Document ID	This field is completed automatically.
Applicant number	This field is completed automatically and is the reference that you should use on all correspondence (this is the 5 or 6 digit number after the dash).
Application details
Project title	Enter the full title of the project.
Project duration	Enter the duration of phase 1 (max 3 months)
Total contract costs	Enter the total phase 1 total costs including VAT (up to £50,000 from public sector)
Proposed start date	Please provide your proposed start date.
What is the best way to describe your innovation?	Please select from the options.
Details of lead applicant (contractor)	Enter the full registered name and other relevant details of the organisation with whom the contract will be placed.
Company contact details	Enter the full name, postcode, email address and telephone number of the main point of contact between Innovate UK and the project. How did you become aware of the competition? (Select from drop down menu.)

4.1 Title and abstract for publication (not scored)

Guidance

To comply with government practice on openness and transparency of public-funded activities, Innovate UK has to publish information relating to funded projects. Please provide a short description of your proposal in a way that will be understandable to the general public. Do not include any commercially confidential information for example, intellectual property (IP) or patent details.

Please describe your project. Funding will not be provided to successful projects without this.

5. Competition questions

When answering each question, we recommend that you breakdown your answers into sub-headings as appropriate.

5.1 Question 1: Approach and Innovation

(Worth 30% of the total marks), 2 pages, plus appendix.

You should: provide a structured summary of the project, its technical basis and its innovation. This should include:

• a description of the project and its innovation and how it will provide a step change on the current state-of-the-art
• a description of how you will approach the challenge and the technologies involved on a work package basis. Highlight any elements of technology transfer. Please emphasise the elements of system integration and how you will overcome imposed constraints
• a description of how the proposed solutions will fit around the varying nature of the challenge going forward and how they are scalable and transferable
• details of any existing intellectual property and its significance to your freedom to operate
• realistic estimates of what benefits might be achieved if the project successfully addresses the competition challenges (ie likely quantified impacts on cost reduction, time-saving and reduced human intervention)
• a brief outline of the likely future stages of development required and timescales needed to take the research/innovation outputs to deployment past stage 2
• additional information included in appendix A

5.2 Question 2: Team and Resources

(Worth 20% of the total marks), 2 pages, plus appendix

You should: demonstrate that the team has the right skills, experience and capacity to successfully deliver the entire project. This should include:

• who is in the team and what are their roles, skills and relevant experience in relation to the approach to be taken. Include why you are best placed to carry out and deliver the project
• the amount of key members time that will be spent on the project.
• the resources (including materials, equipment and facilities) that are needed to deliver the project. How will you make the resources accessible? Include information on where the inactive demonstrator will be sited
• any existing relationships between the project team and how these might benefit the project and/or what new relationships are being developed (particularly SMEs).
• relevant expertise in the team of taking research through to demonstration and commercialisation
• additional information included in appendix B

5.3 Question 3: Planning, risks and management

(Worth 20% of the total marks) 2 pages (1 table and 1 free text on project management), plus appendix

You should provide a plan that identifies the main areas of work within the project for both phases 1 and 2. Provide evidence that the technology can be made into a viable working integrated demonstrator which achieves the proposed objectives. This should include:

• completing the milestone table in the application form. Please describe the key project milestones, resources and success criteria for both phases 1 and 2 in the space provided. Only give a maximum of 2 milestones for phase 1, all other milestones should be for phase 2.
• describe your approach to project management. Identify any key tools and mechanisms that will be used for successful project delivery and management reporting lines
• discussion of the key risks and uncertainties of the project and how they will be mitigated
• how you intend to handle any IP issues that arises during the project
• additional information included in appendix C

5.4 Question 4: Route to market and commercialisation

(Worth 15% of the total marks) 1 page of free text

You should: Provide your understanding of the current market and indicate how you intend to benefit from it as a result of this project. This should include:

• the size of the market you will target
• the main challenges of entering the market
• your current position in this market and its supply chain
• your route to market and how you will be establishing or extending your market position
• identification of other potential markets for the technology and your strategy for exploiting them

5.5 Question 5: Finance and value for money

(Worth 15% of the total marks), 3 pages (2 tables and 1 page of free text)

You should: Demonstrate clear value for money and note that the costs quoted must reflect actual costs at a ’fair market value’ and should not include profit. All costs should include VAT.

You should provide the following information;

• complete the summary of costs table in the application form for carrying out phase 1
• complete the summary of costs table in the application form for carrying out phase 2, recognising these are best estimates at this stage
• a justification of the costs for phases 1 and 2
• a justification for the use of subcontractors, explaining how these will be used and the costs of each
• indicate any additional funding or services being brought to the project, either from the team or third parties that may increase value for money

Please note the assessors are required to judge the application finances, in terms of value for money for example, does the proposed cost for effort and deliverables reflect a fair market price? The costs should not include profit.

The costs can cover the following, as applicable.

Directly incurred costs:

These are costs that are specific to the project and is the amount actually spent, supported by an audit record in justification of a claim. They may include:

• individual labour costs for all those contributing to the project
• material costs (including consumables specific to the project)
• capital equipment costs
• sub-contract costs
• travel and subsistence
• indirect costs
• other costs specifically attributed to the project

Indirect costs

These costs should relate to the amount of effort deployed on the project. You should calculate them, using your own cost rates. They may include:

• general office and basic laboratory consumables
• library services/learning resources
• typing/secretarial
• finance, personnel, public relations and departmental services
• central and distributed computing
• cost of capital employed
• overheads

Itemisation of costs and methods of calculation may be requested to support the application at a later date.

You cannot claim for the design and construction costs of a bespoke building in which the demonstration will be carried out. Costs for the internal modification of an existing structure and the costs of equipment related to the internal layout and services are eligible. Costs associated with renting of an existing building would be eligible.

6. Project appendices

Appendices are submitted with the application form. It is important to note that these are intended to contain supporting information and not as an overflow for answers to the application form questions. You should structure appendices appropriately to add value to your application.

Appendices must conform to the guidance notes below, both in format and length. Appendices which do not follow the guidance will result in ineligible applications that will not be sent for assessment.

In order that assessors can open and read the appendices, each appendix must:

• conform to the maximum length specifications listed below
• be submitted in Portable Document Format (.pdf)
• be legible at 100% zoom/magnification
• display prominently the ‘Project title’ as entered on page 1 of the application form
• be named as set out in the instructions given in the guidance the application process

Appendices may be printed or photocopied in black and white, so colour should not be used as a way of highlighting important information.

Appendix	Guidance
Appendix A Up to 2 sides of A4 PDF format	Use appendix A to include additional information that strongly supports question 1 your ‘proposed approach and innovation’. This can include images, graphics and text.
Appendix B Up to 2 sides of A4 PDF format	Use appendix B to provide evidence to support question 2, that the ‘team and resources’ have the capability to successfully deliver the complete project. This can include, for example, brief CVs of key team members and examples of relevant success stories.
Appendix C Up to 2 sides of A4 PDF format	Use appendix C to support Question 3 ‘Project management, planning and risks’. You should provide a Gantt chart/ plan covering Phases 1 and 2 and a risk analysis table covering both phases.

7. Declarations

The lead applicant is expected to have discussed the application within their own organisation and any other body whose co-operation will be required to deliver the project.

The lead applicant needs to get consent from an authorised officer or appropriate signatory who will sign the contract if successful. The contract is a legally binding document and subject to the outcome of this competition.

By submitting the application and ticking the box you are confirming that the information given in this application, is complete and accurate. You state that you are actively engaged in this project, are responsible for its overall management and will administer the contract if awarded. You are also confirming that you have read and understood all of the relevant explanatory materials and agree to the draft contract terms and conditions.

7.1 Associated documents

It is important that the following documents associated with this competition are read before completing your application. All documents will be available on the ftp site after you have registered.

• Invitation to Tender: ref SBRI_IIND_001
• Technical specification document: ref SBRI_IIND_002
• Draft Contract: ref SBRI_IIND_003
• Application Form ref: 1701_SBRI_NDA_SBRIApplicationVers1.0.3.doc
• Phase 1 Report template: ref SBRI_IIND_004

8. Additional information

Please note that Sellafield Ltd will not be able to act as a partner in any phase 1 or phase 2 projects, nor will they give direct support to individual projects during the application stage. Any questions that may need directing to Sellafield Ltd must come through the Innovate UK Helpdesk. All questions and answers will be circulated to all registrants at least 1 week before the competition closes.