BBSRC ICURe engage November 2024: London & S/SE England
ICURe engage is a 4-week, part-time entrepreneurship programme tailored for bioscience research students and technicians.
Opportunity Details
When
Registration Opens
23/09/2024
Registration Closes
21/10/2024
Award
Online training courses, peer group and mentor support, pathways to accessing further support
Organisation
BBSRC
About the programme
“Innovation-to-Commercialisation of University Research” (ICURe) is the UK’s leading early stage research accelerator programme. It guides researchers through the process of refining and validating the commercial potential for some of the world’s leading-edge science, technology and knowledge assets.
Past participants say that having dedicated time to spend understanding what commercialisation of research means has dramatically changed their perspective on their research, ideas and innovations. The programme introduces ICURe and provides the space and opportunity to think differently about impact, commercialisation and entrepreneurship.
What is engage?
ICURe engage is a 4-week, part-time programme tailored for research students and technicians. This programme aims to identify potential beneficiaries of research, introduce participants to tools for commercialisation, and foster consideration of entrepreneurship as a pathway for achieving societal impact and a viable career choice.
This specific course is for bioscience research students (including those pursuing research master’s degrees and 1st or 2nd year PhD students), PDRAs, and technicians who are interested in entrepreneurship. Applications from South East of England & London are strongly encouraged and will be given priority in this call, as will applications from candidates whose research project, idea, or course of study has been sponsored by BBSRC.
We welcome applications from across the biosciences, including agriculture and food, healthy ageing, engineering biology, industrial biotechnology, and innovative tools and technologies underpinning biological research. If you already have an idea, the idea and the technology, product or service associated to it must be either biological in nature, interact with a biological entity, involve a biological process, or address a biological challenge.
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This BBSRC engage course is for bioscience research students (including those pursuing research master’s degrees and 1st or 2nd year PhD students), PDRAs, and technicians who are interested in entrepreneurship. Applications from South East of England & London are strongly encouraged and will be given priority in this call.
Your course of study, your idea and/or your research MUST be directly related to the biosciences or address a key biological challenge. We particularly encourage applications from candidates whose research project, idea, or course of study has been sponsored by BBSRC.
We are also actively seeking applications from individuals in:
- Universities who have not participated in the ICURe programme.
- Universities who do not receive HEIF funding.
- Under-represented groups including women, people of colour, those living
with disabilities and those from the LGBTQI+ communities. - Approved public sector research enterprises (PSREs).
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Ideas based on medical/clinical devices and therapeutics being developed solely for a specific end-point clinical utility (including diagnostics) will not be accepted. For example, if an applicant’s idea is to develop technology specifically for diagnosing or treating a specific disease, they would not be eligible for BBSRC ICURe engage. However, if the applicant also aims to investigate other market opportunities for this technology outside of the health sector, e.g. for livestock, or if this technology can be pivoted and used as a platform technology then they would be eligible for BBSRC ICURe.
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- 2-day online training bootcamp delivered by impact experts
- Introduction on how commercialisation of your research can deliver impact
- Introduction to ICURe, ideation and design thinking, Value Proposition Canvas, and how a venture delivering impact may be funded
- Weekly, hour-long conversations with peer group support and mentor for 3 weeks
- Around 5 hours of self-study and research over the 3 weeks
- Production of a short video report reflecting on knowledge gained and the impact potential of your own research area
- Pathway towards accessing the BBSRC bioscience ICURe discover and Explore programmes and support (please note that the successful completion of BBSRC engage will not offer an automatic entry to BBSRC Discover and Explore).
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The online application form will ask a series of questions about you, your research project and your idea (if you have one). Please note that there is a limited number of spaces on each BBSRC engage Cohort. We will endeavour to provide support to as many applications as possible; however, if needed, spaces will be offered on a competitive basis. The course is delivered by The Helix Way.