Eligible Activities

Eligible Activities

  • Opportunity Analysis to support your ideas in the Idea Screening Phase
  • Idea Screening
  • Concept development, prototyping and testing
  • Development the marketing and engineering details
  • Identification & investigation of intellectual property, including the process for intellectual property creation, protection (but not patent maintenance fees to Intellectual Property Office or relevant official organisations)
  • Feasibility through virtual computer aided rendering and rapid prototyping
  • Conducting focus group customer interviews
  • Commercialization (often considered post-NPD)
  • Critical path analysis
  • New Product Pricing
  • Impact of new product on the entire product portfolio
  • Analysis of competition and alternative competitive technologies
  • Analysis of costs and selling price
  • Forecast of unit volumes, revenue, and profit
  • Equipment purchases to develop prototypes
  • Capital items to develop physical prototypes
  • Beta Testing and Market Testing
  • Producing a physical prototype or mock-up
  • Testing the product (and its packaging) in typical usage situations
  • Producing an initial run of the product
  • Economic impact assessment
  • Launch new products or services
  • Beta Testing and Market Testing
  • Conducting focus group customer interviews
  • New Product Pricing
  • Producing a physical prototype or mock-up
  • Testing the product (and its packaging) in typical usage situation
  • Opportunity Analysis to support your ideas in the Idea Screening Phase
  • Idea Screening
  • Concept development/Concept testing
  • Critical path analysis
  • Analysis of competition and alternative competitive technologies
  • Analysis of costs and selling price
  • Forecast of unit volumes, revenue, and profit
  • Efficiency audit, process change
  • Off the shelf market research reports
  • Customised market research done through professional consultants & market research
  • Overseas market entry research reports done by specialist Accredited organisations / trade & industry bodies in the UK & overseas
  • Development of innovative business models/ strategy
  • Engineering operations planning
  • Program review and monitoring
  • Contingencies – what-if planning
  • Innovation/technology audit
  • Finalising Quality Management System
  • Department scheduling
  • Supplier collaboration
  • Logistics plan
  • Resource planning/publication
  • Resource estimation
  • Consultancy towards IT Strategy and Value Optimisation
  • Building security algorithms & AI
  • Specialist electronic system, Software design and computer engineering tools
  • Designing of Specialist CRM systems that drive hardware
  • APP design & development for Mobile & portable devices (such as tablets, phones and PDAs)
  • Development of GIS (Geographical Information Systems)
  • Analysis and Design of Algorithms
  • Electronic Communication and Concurrency
  • Compression Methods for Multimedia
  • Cryptography and Information Security
  • System Modelling
  • Distributed Systems and Applications
  • Software Measurement and Quality Assurance
  • Informatics (including Bioinformatics) e.g. Software & hardware design of fingerprint or IRIS or Biometric Identification
  • Scanners etc. that can be controlled through web technologies

Ineligible Activities

  • Website Design
  • Website Coding (exclusions apply – contact team for details)
  • Launch marketing for products not developed in-house
  • Traditional Marketing
    • Leaflets
    • Banners
    • Video production
    • Cold Calling 
    • Radio, TV, online adverts etc.
  • Google / Keyword AdWords
  •  Social Media Marketing (Inc. promoted posts) 
  • Postage 
  • Items purchased to send as samples (Inc. as part of a marketing campaign)

 

We allow product launch marketing for under very specific conditions.  The marketing must be specifically for the launch of a new, as yet unreleased, product, which is not and has not ever been available for purchase a the time of your Innovation Vouchers application. 

  •  Accommodation
  • Car parking
  • Company vehicles
  • Courier services
  • Flights
  • Food and drink
  • Mileage
  • Petrol, diesel or other fuel
  • Refreshments
  • Travel abroad
  • For use as working capital 
  • Shipping / Freight
  • Capital items NOT for use in developing a physical prototype (Inc. laptops, tablets, & other hardware)
  • Stock (excluding specific initial product runs) 
  • Bank or credit card fees, Inc. those associated with an approved Innovation Vouchers project
  • Development of non-bespoke software 
  • Purchase of non-bespoke software 
  • Installation of generic hardware/software
  • Telesales, Adverts / Marketing
  • Forwarding of post for a change of address as part of relocation
  • Ink/toner cartridges or printer ink
  • Internal employee wages/time
  • Monthly bills/annual charges (Inc. telephone, internet, utilities, servicing of equipment, etc)
  • Newspapers/journals
  • Printing Costs (Inc. printing of current promotional material)
  • Postage Costs (Inc. postage of current promotional material)
  • Service/maintenance charges on office equipment
  • Stock items
  • Subscriptions to magazines, etc
  • Time as in-kind contribution
  • Conversion of a building into offices for rental purposes
  • Building a new building or extension, etc
  • Demolition
  • External costs (ie landscape gardening, driveways, exterior furniture)
  • Planning permission/building regulation fees
  • Rent & rates for current or new premises
  • Rent deposit on new premises
  • Roofing
  • Service charges
  • Solar Panels
  • Accountancy fees
  • Accreditation fees 
  • Bank or payments system fees (Inc. fees associated with paying your chosen supplier)
  • Coaching and mentoring
  • Consultancy fees relating to completing the Innovation Vouchers application form
  • Fees associated with registering a trademark
  • Legal fees (Unless as part of approved project activity)
  • Membership fees of professional organisations 
  • Recruitment
  • Salaries 
  • Training 
  • Writing of a generic business plan, generic marketing strategy, etc.
  • Purchase of ‘off-the-shelf’ or white labelled software
  • Development of software not deemed to be ‘innovative’ 

Please note: this list is not exhaustive and may be subject to amendments.