UK Defence Innovation: Rapid transfusion diagnostics - blood testing in the field

UKDI submissions are welcome from the private sector, academia and Public Sector Research Establishments (PSRE’s). UKDI will examine the legal status of organisations prior to placement of any contract or agreement. In most cases there are no nationality restrictions, however UKDI individual competition documents will detail any necessary restrictions.

UKDI encourage collaboration between innovators for this competition. To support this, there is a short survey to collect details of those who wish to explore collaboration possibilities. If you are interested, please complete the collaboration survey.

The information (including personal details) you provide will be circulated among the innovators who have completed the survey. The sharing of details will only be done after an initial screening process has taken place; UKDI reserve the right to not share all details.

All collaboration for proposal submissions is on an innovator-innovator basis. It is the innovators’ responsibility to determine the suitability of collaborators.

Inclusion or absence of collaboration will not affect assessment. The survey will stay open until 12 May 2026.

The total funding available is £3 million (excluding VAT). UKDI expect to fund 4 to 6 proposals, in the region of £500,000 to £700,000 each, but reserve the right to fund proposals at higher and lower values than these amounts.

Technology Readiness Level (TRL): Starting at a minimum of TRL 4, ending at a maximum of TRL 8, progressing through at least one TRL during the project

Contract start month: Aim to start early September 2026

Project duration: Equal to or less than 24 months

The scope of this competition is to develop an innovative, logistically light blood testing device(s) to test for ABO blood group and / or BBV. The device needs to be suitable for point of care use by non-specialists, in operational environments.

Proposals may address one or both of these facets, but it’s highly desirable that both facets are addressed. To achieve this, proposers are encouraged to collaborate with groups offering solutions that would complement their own; the collaboration survey can be used for this purpose.

For essential and desirable criteria for each area, and for further details of the scope, please read the full competition document.

Your proposal should include evidence of:

• the potential for your innovation to be translated into a practical demonstration, whether it be theoretical development, method / technical advancement or proof of concept research
• innovation or a creative approach
• how the proposed work applies to any defence and/or security context

UKDI are not interested in proposals that:

• describe technologies that require a specialist user
• describe technologies that require fixed infrastructure or electrical power (internal or external)
• describe technologies that require significant volumes (circa 2ml) of test reagents
• describe solutions that require more blood than is drawn from standard finger prick from test subjects
• describe technologies that are not low size, weight and power
• outline solutions that do not offer advantages over current deployed point-of-care tests or methodologies such as a blood-typing card
• do not demonstrate accordance with the 3Rs or evidence use of the PREPARE guidelines in planning any work involving animals (regardless of whether this work is performed in the UK or elsewhere)
• do not provide information about the project licence, establishment licence and personal licences for and animal work taking place in the UK (proposals with animal work taking place outside of the UK will need to include the equivalent information)
• include work that requires MOD Research Ethics Committee (MODREC) review but do not account for the time required to achieve favourable opinion in their project timeline (approximately 3 months including mandatory Scientific Assessment Committee review prior to MODREC submission)
• constitute consultancy, paper-based studies or literature reviews which just summarise the existing literature without any view of future innovation
• are an unsolicited resubmission of a previous DASA or UKDI bid
• offer demonstrations of off-the-shelf products requiring no experimental development (unless applied in a novel way to the challenge)
• offer no real long-term prospect of integration into defence and security capabilities
• offer no real prospect of out-competing existing technological solutions

On 19 March 2026  UKDI hosted a launch webinar to provide further detail on the problem space and a chance to ask questions in an open forum. You can watch a recording of the webinar on YouTube.

If you are uncertain of the relevance of your innovation, it is strongly recommended that you contact your local Innovation Partner to discuss your idea. You can initiate this through the submission of a Contact UKDI Form by following instructions on the Contact a UKDI Innovation Partner page if you do not already have an established relationship with your local Innovation Partner.

You can also contact Innovate UK Business Connect’s Defence & Security or Health teams.