DCMS Create Growth Fund: Competition 2 Briefing – Online Q&A Session

About the event

This interactive Q&A session is an opportunity to further the discussion about the Competition 2 Briefing and answer any specific questions regarding the £6 million fund for innovation projects to support growth within the creative industries.

The Q&A session will be held by: Emma Cooper, Emma Fadlon and Daisy Rowland.

Competition Overview

Watch the webinar recording about the competition (recorded 27 October 2023)

Find out more about the competition here (closing date: 10 Jan 2024)

UK registered creative SMEs within appointed regions, can apply for grant funding alongside private investment from selected investor partners to support growth. Innovate UK, part of UK Research and Innovation, is to fund up to £6 million in innovation projects. This funding is from the Department for Culture, Media & Sport (DCMS) Create Growth Programme.

The DCMS Create Growth Investor Partnership programme brings together:

• Innovate UK’s expertise in identifying innovation and using grant funding to change the risk profile of businesses in the creative industries.
• Investor partners’ aligned funding and expertise in identifying opportunities and teams that can best use extra investment finance.

Your project must:

• have a total project costs between £100,000 and £750,000
• start by 1 June 2024
• end by 28 February 2025
• last between 6 and 8 months
• carry out all of its project work in the UK
• intend to exploit the results from or in the UK
• have an investor named on your application

This competition is specifically for businesses registered or operational in the successfully appointed Create Growth Programme Regions.

Specific themes

The creative industries are defined by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS). Your project must focus on one or more of the following sub-sectors:

• advertising and marketing
• architecture
• crafts
• design and designer fashion
• film
• television
• video
• radio
• photography
• IT, gaming, software and computer services
• publishing
• museums, galleries and libraries
• music, performing and visual art

Creative industry businesses refer to those with a high intensity of creative occupations. You can refer to the DCMS Economic Estimates for a list of the sub-sectors and their associated SIC codes, that DCMS classifies under the creative industries.