GrantRadar

Innovate UK

Advancing innovation in accelerated cancer diagnosis

Innovate UK collaborative R&D grants, run for the Office for Life Sciences' Cancer Healthcare Goals programme, for the clinical validation and evaluation of technologies and devices that diagnose cancer earlier. Projects with less common cancers in mind (anything other than breast, prostate, lung and bowel cancer, plus rare forms of those four) are particularly encouraged. A UK business, academic institution or NHS organisation leads a consortium that must include an SME claiming funding and a practising clinician, clinical academic or clinical delivery team. Projects have total eligible costs of £1.5 million to £4 million, last 24 to 36 months, and shortlisted teams are interviewed in January 2027.

Apply on the funder’s site
You could get
£1,500,000 – £3,000,000
Closes in
10 days left
28 October
Effort
Heavy
budgets, references, often several stages

Who can apply

  • The lead must be a UK registered business of any size, an academic institution or an NHS organisation, and must lead a collaboration: academic institutions cannot work alone
  • Community Interest Companies and charities are not allowed to lead
  • The consortium must include at least one UK registered micro, small or medium-sized enterprise claiming grant, and a practising clinician or clinical academic, or involve a clinical delivery team
  • Collaborators can be UK registered businesses, academic institutions, public sector organisations (including NHS and NIHR organisations such as Health Innovation Networks), charities, not for profits or research and technology organisations
  • The lead and at least one other organisation must claim funding, and no single organisation can claim more than 70% of total project costs
  • Non-funded partners can include EU and other non-UK organisations; subcontractors are allowed, with a detailed case needed for any overseas subcontractor
  • An organisation can lead only one application (the first submitted counts; later ones are ineligible) and a lead can collaborate on two further applications; non-leading businesses, academics, public sector bodies, charities and not for profits can collaborate on any number
  • Funded work must be carried out in the UK, with results exploited in the UK
  • Projects must last 24 to 36 months, start by 1 April 2027 and end by 31 March 2030
  • Organisations in financial difficulty cannot be funded

What it funds

Projects developing, validating or evaluating diagnostic technologies or approaches that show clear potential for clinical and health economic impact and enable earlier detection and diagnosis of cancer, particularly less common cancers. Projects can focus on one or more of:

  • Next generation diagnostic technologies and devices to drive earlier diagnosis of cancer, including less common cancers
  • Novel technologies and devices that improve patient access to diagnostic services, by empowering patients and primary care teams to identify more people with early symptoms, enabling earlier diagnosis, or reducing strain on services (for example self-assessment tools, pharmacy-led triage and direct to test pathways)
  • Multi-modal approaches to assess an individual's cancer risk using several factors, including genomic, demographic, imaging and biomarker data, and multianalyte combinations
  • Activities can include: clinical validation and evaluation studies, early phase clinical trials, safety and efficacy testing, technology demonstration in relevant and operational environments, regulatory planning and product development

industrial research and experimental development projects are funded. Businesses get up to 70% (micro or small), 60% (medium) or 50% (large) of eligible costs for industrial research, and 45%, 35% or 25% for experimental development. Research organisations doing non-economic work can share up to 50% of total eligible costs, funded at 100% (RTOs, charities, not for profits, public sector and research organisations) or 80% of full economic cost (academic institutions). No more than £3 million per enterprise, per project can be awarded as grant.

What it will not fund

  • Companion diagnostics
  • Therapeutics or treatment development
  • Discovery research
  • Routine deployment of late stage technologies into frontline services
  • Technologies focusing on pure service redesign
  • Technologies focusing on cancer recurrence detection, monitoring or treatment response prediction
  • Projects dependent on export performance
  • Projects dependent on domestic inputs usage

How to apply

  1. Read the competition brief and Innovate UK's guidance on applying through the Innovation Funding Service; the briefing recording and slides from 3 September 2026 are available
  2. Form your consortium, including an SME claiming funding and clinical input, and invite each partner into the Innovation Funding Service
  3. Complete the project details (summary, public description and scope, up to 400 words each)
  4. Answer the 21 application questions, up to 400 words each; questions 1 to 6 (location, animals, permits, international collaboration, export licence, trusted research) are not scored, and 7 to 21 cover the clinical problem, idea, benefits, design, milestones, route to market, risks, skills, market, competitors, IP and the case for public funding
  5. Each partner enters its own finances (academics use TRAC) and completes the Project Impact questions
  6. The lead submits by 11am on 28 October 2026; you can reopen and resubmit up to the deadline
  7. Three independent assessors score the application; if invited (7 December 2026), send your attendee list, PowerPoint slides and a spend profile on the template, plus an optional written response to feedback of up to two A4 pages
  8. Attend an online interview between 11 and 15 January 2027: a 20-minute presentation if requesting up to £2 million (30 minutes above that), then 30 or 45 minutes of questions

Innovate UK estimates about a 15% chance of success. Projects cannot start until the Grant Offer Letter is approved. For reasonable adjustments, contact Innovate UK at least 15 working days before the deadline.

Have ready

  • Online application on the Innovation Funding Service with project details, 21 question answers, finances and Project Impact answers from every partner
  • TRAC costings from academic institutions
  • If invited to interview: list of attendees, PowerPoint presentation (up to 20 or 30 slides), and a suggested spend profile on the template provided
  • Optional: written response to assessor feedback, up to two A4 pages as a single PDF or Word document

do not include website addresses in answers; they will not be opened.

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