Driving the Electric Revolution – building talent for the future

Innovate UK’s Driving the Electric Revolution challenge, part of UK Research and Innovation, will invest up to £250,000 in projects building talent for the future.

The aim of this competition is to fund several ideas that quickly fill immediate gaps in skills, talent and training for the power electronics, machines and drives (PEMD) industry.

Your proposal must deliver a clear game-changing intervention, which would realistically and significantly meet a UK PEMD talent requirement.

Your project must:

• start on 1 February 2022
• end on 30 April 2022
• last up to 3 months
• carry out its project work in the UK
• intend to exploit the results from or in the UK

We expect projects to have total eligible project costs of between £10,000 to £25,000.

If your total eligible project costs are more than £25,000, only the maximum grant limit of £25,000 can be claimed.

To lead a project or work alone your organisation must be a UK registered business of any size, research organisation, charity or public sector organisation. To collaborate with the lead, your organisation must be a UK registered business of any size, academic institution, charity, not-for-profit, public sector organisation, research organisation or research and technology organisation (RTO).

The aim of this competition is to fund projects that fill gaps in skills, talent and training for the power electronics, machines and drives (PEMD) industry.

Your project must demonstrate.

• an innovative, ambitious and realistic idea, to meet a significant PEMD talent requirement
• that it is innovative to the UK, a region or a specific group of people and not already available
• the capacity and capability to deliver the project successfully and on time
• value for money and a credible, evidenced return on investment, in terms of trained, upskilled and reskilled people

You can:

• produce ideas and material for outreach, engagement and learning purposes
• conduct PEMD outreach and engagement exercises to individuals, academia, industry and other groups
• generate and deliver course material or facilitate the running of courses
• provide training or incentives for training to specific groups of people or in specific training subjects

This list is not intended to be exhaustive.

Your project must focus on one or more of the following:

• supporting and promoting equality, diversity, and inclusion within PEMD technology training, manufacturing, or research
• outreach and engagement material focussing on PEMD for all ages and levels in academia and industry
• defining and filling key gaps in the UK’s PEMD workforce and training capability

An online briefing event was held on 10th August 2021: click here to watch the recording.

If you want help to find a project partner, contact Paul Huggett at KTN.