Friday, 09 December 2022
People with ideas for change are being invited to turn them into exciting new businesses, with the help of university experts.
Budding entrepreneurs can submit their ideas to the Ingenuity Programme, a business creation competition, where they will be supported to develop and progress their initial idea with the help of experts from the UK’s top universities, charities and businesses. This year’s prize fund available to winners totals £75,000.
The Ingenuity Programme, run by Nottingham University Business School, supports start-ups to directly address the UK’s social and environmental challenges to drive change in local communities. By entering the Programme, entrepreneurs will receive one-on-one support from specialist mentors to develop their idea into a business plan and be in with a chance of receiving significant investment and support.
Entrepreneurs will also have access to online learning materials and tutorials from industry and academic experts. The programme brings together a network of 30 partner universities, charities, and businesses across the UK to support ideas that promote sustainable ways of living.
The 2023 programme has been designed alongside Nuffield Health, the programme’s key supporter, with the focus aligned to Nuffield Health’s purpose to build a healthier nation. The programme is looking for ideas that focus on building stronger communities, improve health and address health inequalities, and promote environmental sustainability.
At Ingenuity, we are committed to making the UK’s start-up landscape more inclusive, diverse and accessible. You don’t need any prior business experience to take part, and we will provide you with all the support you need to turn your ideas into a reality.
Elizabeth continued: “Being able to collaborate and design the programme with charities like Nuffield Health has allowed us to support more people than ever before. We are proud to have delivered more than £750,000 of social benefit through last year’s programme, and look forward to working with the next generation of changemakers this year to tackle issues such as the cost of living crisis, climate change and widening health inequalities.”
We are really excited for the launch of Ingenuity 2023. The themes this year continue to align closely with our purpose to build a healthier nation – not only through health and wellbeing, but by shining a light on protecting our environment and sustainable living.
Brendan continued: “We are also proud to have the opportunity to work with, and support, people from under-served groups to help bring their ideas to life and make meaningful impact in the communities in which they live. It’s inspiring to see the impact the winners from last year have already made within their communities, and I look forward to seeing this year’s innovative programmes building more sustainable and healthier communities.”
Keasha Kellam was awarded the 2022 Impact Entrepreneur of the Year title. Powered by her own lived experience, Keasha Kellam founded ‘Honour Thy Woman’, a community support group that helps domestic abuse survivors in the local area.
After recognising a gap in the support available to domestic abuse survivors, she formed the idea and began assembling a group of volunteers. Keasha later joined the Ingenuity Programme and was supported to turn the volunteer-led group into a financially sustainable social enterprise with a business model and a five-year business plan.
During the programme, Keasha was also able to further develop another idea for providing safe accommodation for women and incorporate this into her business plan. Keasha benefited from the help of a host of academic and business experts, who provided advice on Intellectual Property, developing a Unique Selling Point for the business, pricing structure, and pitching to investors.
The funding Keasha received after winning the national prize has enabled her to employ a Research and Developer to build a programme so that the business can work with international partners.
Keasha Kellam said: “I’m a domestic abuse survivor, but my whole team has experienced domestic abuse so it’s by the community, for the community.”
The Programme did even more for me than I imagined and I was delighted to win the national award. Since winning, so many more opportunities have opened up to me as a result. The authenticity of winning an award has helped me to network with potential collaborators and investors, and I have been able to successfully attract more funding.
The programme’s learning platform, accessible to all entrants, includes a step-by-step process to help entrepreneurs to think through the finance, marketing, impact measurement, copyright, and organisational development of their solution.
By the end of the programme, each start-up will submit their finished business plans to be assessed by industry experts. The most scalable and impactful ideas from each region will be announced as Regional Finalists. From there, winners will be chosen.
The Ingenuity Programme supports social mobility by providing seed grants and mentorship to innovators looking to start new enterprises, aiming to engage innovators from under-represented and underserved groups across the UK.
To date, Ingenuity has supported more than 3,000 innovators and delivered over £1million in seed funding, including to The Anxiety Map Programme, which created a network of venues trained in anxiety accessibility for people living with anxiety or mental ill health.
Find out more about the competition here and enter the competition here.
Former Ingenuity Programme winner case studies
Ryan Brown, co-founder of Cilo,
East Midlands Champion 2022
Ryan Brown, a 2022 Ingenuity Programme winner, was awarded the East Midlands Champion title. He founded the business, Cilo, with Laurence Collingwood in 2020; an app designed to empower positive climate action by allowing users to see the carbon cost of products, track their daily spending, and receive personalised tips to reduce their impact.
The funding from the Programme has allowed Ryan and Laurence to continue working full-time on the business while they prepare for a beta app store release later this year. After that, they plan to expand their beta-testing program and begin corporate trials to inform their development over the next 12 months.
Ryan, who graduated from the University of Nottingham in 2017 with a BEng in Architectural Engineering, said: “Laurence and I founded Cilo because individuals have an immense power to mitigate climate change, but it can be difficult to know where to start, and even harder to know if your actions are making an impact. The most helpful part of the experience was the one-to-one coaching sessions, which were invaluable in developing our pitch.”
Charmaine Daley, Founder of Global Dance
2022 Brenda Dean Award for Female Enterprise
Charm Daley’s Global Dance is a practical resource package with easy-to-follow dance and music from different parts of the globe with cultural attributes, giving children a safe space to talk and learn about difference, race, and heritage whilst getting much-needed physical activity.
After winning funding and the Female Enterprise Award, Charm is looking to build her professional network in education to roll Global Dance out locally in Nottingham and the surrounding regions. The funding will help her to get her business off the ground, finding support to create a website and branding.
“I loved having my idea professionally and constructively analysed and scrutinised, it made me think more objectively - the mentor support was outstanding,” she said. “The Ingenuity process has given me the belief in myself that I can achieve this. I am so excited.”
Story credits
More information is available from Elizabeth Smith, Head of the Ingenuity Programme at the University of Nottingham at Elizabeth.Smith@nottingham.ac.uk
Notes to editors:
About the University of Nottingham
Ranked 32 in Europe and 16th in the UK by the QS World University Rankings: Europe 2024, the University of Nottingham is a founding member of the Russell Group of research-intensive universities. Studying at the University of Nottingham is a life-changing experience, and we pride ourselves on unlocking the potential of our students. We have a pioneering spirit, expressed in the vision of our founder Sir Jesse Boot, which has seen us lead the way in establishing campuses in China and Malaysia - part of a globally connected network of education, research and industrial engagement.
Nottingham was crowned Sports University of the Year by The Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide 2024 – the third time it has been given the honour since 2018 – and by the Daily Mail University Guide 2024.
The university is among the best universities in the UK for the strength of our research, positioned seventh for research power in the UK according to REF 2021. The birthplace of discoveries such as MRI and ibuprofen, our innovations transform lives and tackle global problems such as sustainable food supplies, ending modern slavery, developing greener transport, and reducing reliance on fossil fuels.
The university is a major employer and industry partner - locally and globally - and our graduates are the second most targeted by the UK's top employers, according to The Graduate Market in 2022 report by High Fliers Research.
We lead the Universities for Nottingham initiative, in partnership with Nottingham Trent University, a pioneering collaboration between the city’s two world-class institutions to improve levels of prosperity, opportunity, sustainability, health and wellbeing for residents in the city and region we are proud to call home.
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