Freight Innovation Fund: last chance to apply
The Department for Transport (DfT) has launched a new fund to help businesses to develop more efficient and greener solutions for freight.
The Freight Innovation Fund aims to support SMEs with solutions to current challenges faced in the United Kingdom’s freight sector. It also aims to develop a future pipeline of solutions to meet the sector’s emerging needs. The programme will take a cross-modal view of the end-to-end freight journey, deploying solutions in real-world environments.
The programme will identify and trial new services and products coming to market in the freight sector. It will support innovative organisations across the sector. It will also support the market to reach the ambitions of both the DfT and the UK economy.
DfT has committed £7 million to the programme to support SMEs through the Accelerator Programme and Freight Innovation Cluster until 2024.
Applications to the Accelerator will close on Sunday 5 February 2023.
Freight Innovation Fund Accelerator
The programme will select up to 36 SMEs over three open calls until 2024. Selected SMEs will join a six-month programme. They will each have the opportunity to acquire up to £150,000 of grant funding to trial their solutions with industry partners.
Freight Innovation Cluster
The Freight Innovation Cluster complements the Accelerator. It will be the go-to community for innovative organisations operating in the freight industry.
Through sector-specific engagement activities, ad hoc business support, cross-pollination opportunities, and community-building exercises, the cluster aims to become a vibrant ecosystem, where new ideas and collaboration can thrive.
The Freight Innovation Cluster is open to anyone in the freight industry, including industry partners, innovative SMEs and academia. Technology-agnostic, this initiative will focus on developing innovation across the sector and will last for the whole duration of the programme.
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