Innovate UK is investing up to £25.4 million to help UK organisations prove that new cancer diagnostic technologies work in the clinic, with individual grants of up to £3 million.
The competition sits under the Office for Life Sciences' Cancer Healthcare Goals programme, and it's aimed at getting diagnostic technologies out of the lab and through clinical validation. There's a particular interest in the less common cancers, meaning anything outside breast, prostate, lung and bowel, where diagnosis still tends to come too late.
Below, I have explained the key things you need to know about this competition before you apply: who is eligible, how much funding is on the table, and what the application process looks like.
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Who is Eligible?
Your Organisation
To lead a project, you must be a UK registered business of any size, an academic institution or an NHS organisation. Community Interest Companies and charities can't lead, and academic institutions can't work alone.
This is a collaborative competition, so you can't apply on your own. The lead and at least one other organisation must request funding, and the consortium must include at least one UK registered micro, small or medium-sized enterprise.
You can work with the following as collaborators:
- Academic institutions
- Businesses of any size
- Charities
- Not for profits
- Public sector organisations
- Research and technology organisations (RTOs)
No single organisation can claim more than 70% of the total project costs. You can also bring in partners who don't claim any funding, including organisations based outside the UK, and subcontractors are allowed.
Your Project
Your project must:
- Have total eligible costs between £1.5 million and £4 million
- Start by 1 April 2027, on the first of the month
- Last between 24 and 36 months
- End by 31 March 2030
All funded work must be carried out in the UK, and you must intend to exploit the project results from or within the UK.
Your project must also:
- Develop, validate or evaluate a diagnostic technology or approach with clear potential for clinical and health economic impact
- Drive earlier diagnosis of cancer, including the less common cancers
- Include a practising clinician, a clinical academic, or a clinical delivery team
Innovate UK won't fund projects that:
- Are companion diagnostics
- Are focused on discovery research
- Develop therapeutics or treatments
- Focus on cancer recurrence detection, monitoring or treatment response prediction
- Focus on pure service redesign
- Routinely deploy late stage technologies into frontline services
How Much Funding Can I Apply For?
The amount you can claim depends on your organisation's type and size and the sort of research your project involves.
Individual grants are capped at £3 million per organisation.
Applying as a Company
| Project Type | Micro and Small | Medium | Large |
|---|---|---|---|
| Industrial Research* | 70% | 60% | 50% |
| Experimental Development** | 45% | 35% | 25% |
*Industrial research refers to planned research aimed at acquiring new knowledge for developing new products, processes, or services.
**Experimental development is closer to market. It involves using existing knowledge to develop or improve products, processes, or services.
Funding Example
If you're a small company running an industrial research project with £2 million of eligible costs, you could claim 70%, which is a grant of £1.4 million. You will need to fund the remaining £600,000 from other sources, like R&D Tax Relief, investment or loans.
Applying as a Non-Commercial Organisation
Non-economic organisations can share up to 50% of the total eligible project costs and are funded at higher rates:
- Up to 100% of eligible costs if you are a charity, not-for-profit, public sector organisation, research organisation, or RTO
- Up to 80% of full economic costs (FEC) if you're a Je-S-registered institution, like a university
How Do I Apply?
The deadline for applications is 28 October 2026.
Applications are submitted via Innovate UK's Innovation Funding Service (IFS) portal.
The application is split into four sections:
Project Details
This section covers:
- Application details
- Application team
- Project summary
- Public description
- Research category
- Scope
Most answers in this section are limited to 400 words.
Application Questions
There are 21 questions in total:
- Six unscored administrative questions covering topics like animal testing, international collaboration and export licences
- Fifteen scored questions covering your business need, technical approach, team, market, route to market, impacts, project management, risks, value for money, and the case for public funding
Finances
You'll complete a finance form for every organisation claiming funding, setting out your project costs.
Project Impact
You'll answer a set of questions on the wider impact you expect your project to have.
Your application will be reviewed by three independent assessors. Their individual scores will be combined to determine your final result.
If you're successful, you'll be notified by 21 January 2027. Applications that pass the initial assessment may be invited to an interview between 11 and 15 January 2027.
Like with most competitions, Innovate UK takes a 'portfolio approach' by funding projects across different technologies, markets and technological maturities. This means that a strong score won't necessarily guarantee that your application will be successful.
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