Funding opportunity - Innovate UK.

[whole diary]

[grahame]

Funding opportunity - Innovate UK^▸ (United Kingdom).

From a contact ... can anyone supply the links?  Lots of Welsh - but there are briefings in York and London too - anyone have any details?

-------- Original Message --------

         SUBJECT:
         Innovate UK - First of a Kind (FoaK) 2 Rail Competition Briefing -
Innovate UK - Achlysur Briffio Cyntaf o'i fath (FoaK) 2 Cystadleuaeth
Rheilffyrdd

         DATE:
         05/10/2018 14:53

         FROM:
         "Sell2Wales" <WelshGovernment@public.govdelivery.com>

         TO:
         [my contact]

         REPLY-TO:
         WelshGovernment@public.govdelivery.com

         Cardiff 17th October - Caerdydd 17fed Mis Hydref

[1]

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         Search Contracts [2]            Search Buyers [3]         
Help & Resources [4]          News & Events [5]

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INNOVATE UK - FIRST OF A KIND (FOAK) 2 RAIL COMPETITION BRIEFING

Innovate UK, (from the Department for Transport (DfT^» (Department for Transport - about))), is running a
single-phase competition with a budget of up to £3.5 million. Projects
will be 100% funded.

Decarbonisation may be of interest to companies in the Automotive,
Aerospace, Energy and Other Sectors. Customer experience may be of
interest to companies in Software/ICT, Creative, Construction,
Manufacturing and Other Sectors.

The themes for this FoaK2 competition are:

DECARBONISING THE RAILWAYS:

    * Decarbonisation is a priority across the network, including
stations, rolling stock and infrastructure.
    * Optimising energy use is a challenge that prioritises optimised
on-board and lineside energy storage technologies, energy recovery
systems, small-scale energy generation and harvesting technologies,
novel electrification techniques and lightweight vehicle technology.

CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE IN STATIONS:

    * Innovative technology integrated for the first time in a railway
station.
    * Innovative solutions to enhance the passengers' experience of using
the station.

In the event you will have the opportunity to meet representatives of:-

    * Network Rail
    * Transport for Wales
    * Kelois Amey
    * Porterbrook
    * Global Centre of Rail Excellence in Wales 

The scope and competition process presentations will be available via
webcast and you can register to join this section of the day online HERE
[6]. There will also be briefings in:-

    * York [7] (9th October)
    * London [8] (11th October)
    * CARDIFF (17TH OCTOBER). [9]

For further Competition Details CLICK HERE. [10]

[stuving]

Official entry page here - but it doesn't open until Monday 8th.

Summary reads:

This is a Small Business Research Initiative (SBRI) competition and is open to organisations of all sizes. The aim of the competition is to demonstrate innovations to stakeholders and railway customers in a representative railway environment.

This competition has 2 themes to choose from:

1.    Customer experience in stations.
2.    Decarbonisation of the railway.

We expect to fund up to 12 projects. The assessors will consider fair value in making their evaluation. The contract will be awarded to the lead applicant. Other organisations can be involved in the project as subcontractors.

If your project’s total costs fall outside of our eligibility criteria, you must provide justification by email to support@innovateuk.ukri.org at least 10 days before the competition closes. We will decide whether to approve your request.

Funding type            Procurement

Project size             
We expect to fund projects with total costs between £250,000 and £350,000, including VAT^▸ (Value Added Tax). Projects must plan to start by 1 March 2019 and can last up to 9 months. Projects longer than 9 months will not be supported.

[grahame]

Official entry page here - but it doesn't open until Monday 8th.

Much appreciate the link and summary - Thanks

[stuving]

Awards were announced today for the third round (FOAK3) - did we miss FOAK2?

Drones capable of inspecting railway infrastructure, hydrogen train trials and a sound-bending wall to cut noise pollution are among 24 winning projects in the third round of the First of a Kind (FOAK) competition, unveiled by the Department for Transport today (13 June 2019).

Run by Innovate UK^▸ (United Kingdom) and funded by the DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) to support research, development and innovation in the UK rail industry, the competition seeks innovative ideas that can be adapted to transform rail travel.

Strengthening resilience of railway infrastructure and operations, enhancing rail freight services, and reducing environmental and noise impacts were the themes for this round. Each of the winning schemes will receive between £250,000 and £350,000.

Note that those are just three examples picked for the news release - there are dozens of awards. One topical one, given the recent inquest verdict about the Frampton Mansell level crossing, is to Thales Ground Transportation Systems UK Limited for "ASSIGN: Advisory System for SIGNallers for improved User Worked Crossing Resilience" (£345,000). This is described as an application to provide train time of arrival information at UWCs^▸ (User Worked Crossing) to signallers.

Full details of this competition (listed as part of SBRI) are in the (rather long) Innovate UK funding competition winners 2019 page:

FOAK3   Resilience, Freight, Noise & Environment
FOAK2   demonstrating tomorrow’s stations and a greener railway
 

[stuving]

There's been a fourth round of what may be the same thing - though with a different name, so it's hard to tell. And I can't find any useful web page to tell you, either. The list of projects is here.

One of those is "Dynamic light for wayfinding & management of passenger flows at stations", which says:

The UK^▸ (United Kingdom) Rail Industry has identified that efficient passenger flow in stations has the potential to deliver benefits of £258m by improving capacity, enhancing customer experience and efficiency savings. Research has shown that lighting can influence behaviour and speed of movement of people. Modern LED lights have the potential to incorporate a range of functions that can be used for wayfinding and crowd management. DW Windsor is a UK lighting manufacturer and Urban Control a UK based smart cities company that provides Internet of Things-based control systems. DW Windsor and Urban Control are collaborating on an innovative project to develop dynamic lighting to improve the customer experience at stations. A consortium of Nottingham University, Railway Safety and Standards Board (RSSB^▸ (Rail Safety and Standards Board)) and the Centre for Sensors and Imaging Systems (CENSIS) will undertake research, trials and evaluate the benefits of this new technology to demonstrate the return on investment (ROI).

And a demonstration of this has been announced by RSSB:

30 January 2020: Dynamic lighting to improve passenger behaviour
This has been developed with funding from Innovate UK. We will be demonstrating the products and presenting the findings from the trial at Chippenham Station. To find out more and book a place, please get in touch.

Now, that title isn't identifying exactly the same objective ... and why Chippenham? And who's it for if it needs a place bookedf?

Note the timescale - grant announced in July, results demonstrated in November - that suggests to me the two developers had already made their thing and the project content has been to assess if it's any use.