Business Innovation Fund

The Business Innovation Fund aims to achieve greater progress, and at a faster rate, in delivering economic opportunity across York and North Yorkshire by providing the right conditions to attract new investment and support our businesses to be more innovative, productive and resilient.

Get Exporting

The Mayor of York and North Yorkshire has unlocked a new wave of export funding for businesses, taking the total support up to £900,000.

The third round of the Get Exporting programme is available for applications today with £265,000 in grants for businesses to tap into. Click or tap here for more information on how to apply.

Get Exporting offers businesses grants worth between £3,000 and £10,000 to drive sales of their products or services across the world.

So far, the programme has already given around 70 businesses the backing they need to set out on export missions across North America, Europe and Asia.

Get Exporting with your business

Great Ideas

Great Ideas is a new £2.5 million business innovation programme, part of the Mayor of York and North Yorkshire’s Business Innovation Fund.

It offers personalised innovation support and gives eligible businesses the opportunity to pitch for purpose-built grants of up to £60,000 to help them implement their innovative ideas.

Get backing for your Great Ideas

Get Funded

Get Funded is a fully funded programme helping SMEs in York & North Yorkshire understand finance, build investment readiness, and unlock real growth opportunities.

Get funding for your business

Spin-Out & Start-Up

The Spin-Out and Spin-Out programme is well on its way. We have now commissioned public policy experts SQW to understand the barriers that talent from our three universities face when they try and turn their ideas into a reality. They will develop an overview of the current landscape, leading to an action plan of recommendations for our universities.

Sector Activity

After a successful launch and first phase, the Sector Activity programme of the Business Innovation Fund is now complete with all funding allocated.

We will share updates on how this work is progressing, and you can find a list of who was funded by clicking or tapping here.

Prospectus

Please view the Prospectus for information on the opportunities available within the Business Innovation Fund and how to get involved.
An indicative £5 million has been made available from September 24 to March 27 to deliver the Business Innovation Fund
The Fund has been divided into five programmes of activity:
1) Sector Activity programme

2) Spin-Out & Start-Up programme

3) ‘Get Exporting’ programme

4) ‘Great Ideas’ programme

5) ‘Get Funded’ programme

The different programmes have been designed to target different types of business innovation and to achieve different objectives.
The prospectus provides further detail on opportunities for: experienced business support and grant providers; existing and new clusters of businesses based in York and North Yorkshire; and individual businesses based in York and North Yorkshire with demonstrable interest in exporting.

How to apply

Information on how to apply can be found in the Prospectus. Please note, the application process differs between programmes. This is outlined in the Prospectus.

Click here to apply for Get Exporting Phase Two.

Key Outcomes

Increase Business Innovation – achieve greater progress at a faster rate.
Support our businesses to be more innovative, productive & resilient.
Create the right conditions to attract new investment.
Map the business base of York & North Yorkshire and benchmark/quantify the best ways to target business innovation programmes.

Get in touch

If you have any further questions, please fill in the following form and a member of the team will be in touch.

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