‘Navigating the Funding Landscape Workshop’ - a review
Following the success of previous ‘Navigating the Funding Landscape’ workshops across the South East of England, the IAS in collaboration with Marine South East and the Southampton Enterprise Hub, ran a full-day funding workshop aimed at marine sector companies.
Held in the Southampton Science Park the event informed companies about the sometimes confusing range of funding options available and how to access them. The presentations during the event were delivered by experts who have successfully guided companies to funding over the past 5 years. This included current assessors for several major funding programmes and Finance South East.
Huw Edwards (IAS) led the workshop with a brief tour of the numerous funding options available to businesses, and presented some shrewd thoughts as to which funding options should be considered in different situations. The rest of the day looked at the various funding options in closer detail.
Peter Newton (IAS) gave a very informative presentation on government grants available for funding R& D projects. Peter’s direct involvement in the field allowed him to give extremely practical advice on how to go about making an R& D grant claim.
Representatives from Oxford Innovation’s investment networks gave fascinating presentations on investment networks and business angels, highlighting where these are positioned on the ‘funding ladder’ and in what circumstances this type of finance might benefit an organization.
Finance South East, who provides funding solutions and advice to businesses in the South East of England, also gave in-depth presentations on some of the funding packages they can provide.
Huw Edwards’s second presentation of the day looked at the EC 7th Framework programme in some detail. Huw’s personal experience as a panelist on this programme gave an insightful perspective to this subject.
Presentations from various tax experts helped delegates to unpick the complexities of R& D Tax Credits, and invariably a lively discussion followed this hot topic.
After lunch, Peter Newton helped delegates get to grips with UK Collaborative Programmes and how they may benefit organizations that may not have previously considered this approach. The workshop session at the end gave delegates the opportunity to ask more specific questions to a panel group of experts and discuss some issues in greater detail.
The workshops also gave delegates the opportunity to learn more about the work of other government funded business support services such as SEHTA, Marine South East, and the regional Enterprise Hubs.
Send this story to a colleague
