DRIVE35 Innovation Fund: Collaborate 3

Overview

The DRIVE35 Innovation Fund: Collaborate 3 competition supports ambitious late-stage collaborative R&D projects that accelerate the UK's transition to zero emission vehicles and strengthen the future of the UK automotive industry.

Delivered by the Department for Business and Trade (DBT) in partnership with Innovate UK and the Advanced Propulsion Centre UK (APC), the competition invests in projects that design, develop and enable the manufacture of strategically important automotive technologies. Successful projects should demonstrate a clear route to commercialisation while strengthening UK manufacturing capability, improving supply chain resilience and creating long-term economic growth.

Projects must focus on technologies that support zero emission vehicles, improve manufacturing competitiveness or advance software-defined vehicle technologies and electrical/electronic architectures.

Scope

Projects must support the UK's transition to zero emission vehicles and contribute towards a net zero automotive industry by designing, developing and manufacturing strategically important automotive technologies.

Projects must demonstrate:

• support for growth, transition and resilience within the UK automotive supply chain by improving capability, productivity, efficiency and competitiveness
• contribution towards UK strategic priorities, including the Government's Industrial Strategy and the Automotive Council's Roadmaps and Strategic Technology Areas
• the ability to enable future vehicle manufacture and strengthen high-value production for domestic and export markets
• delivery of on-vehicle technologies or manufacturing capabilities that support the transition to zero emission vehicles
• a clear commercialisation strategy demonstrating how the innovation will be brought to market or deployed within industry following project completion
• creation and safeguarding of high-value jobs throughout the project and beyond, generating lasting economic benefit for the UK
• support for long-term investment in UK automotive research and development

The competition supports collaborative research and development projects that design, develop and enable the manufacture of technologies with a clear route to post-project commercialisation.

Innovate UK will adopt a portfolio approach, supporting projects across a range of technologies, markets, organisational sizes, manufacturing maturities and research categories.

Key themes and topics

Projects must focus on one or more of the following themes.

Theme 1: Promote zero emission vehicle technologies

Projects must focus on product or process innovation for on-board vehicle applications in one or more of the following areas:

• Electrical energy storage, including batteries, supercapacitors, components, battery management systems and integration technologies.
• Electric machines and associated driveline technologies.
• Power electronics, including Vehicle-to-Everything (V2X) technologies.
• Internal combustion engines for on-road applications that achieve zero harmful tailpipe emissions using non-fossil fuels.
• Internal combustion engines for off-road applications supporting the transition to zero emissions using non-fossil fuels.
• Lightweight vehicle and powertrain structures.
• Fuel cell systems and associated balance of plant.
• Hydrogen storage and management systems.

Projects may also include:

• upstream supply chain innovation, including raw materials, component manufacture and subassembly manufacture
• circular economy and design for disassembly, including remanufacturing, recovery and material reuse
• digital validation, verification and design tools that improve development and engineering processes

Theme 2: Enhance manufacturing competitiveness

Projects should improve manufacturing productivity, reduce embedded carbon and strengthen the UK's automotive supply chain through innovation in:

• digital transformation, including AI, digital twins, machine vision and Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT)
• manufacturing process decarbonisation through reduced energy consumption, non-fossil energy sources and carbon capture or reuse
• lean manufacturing techniques that improve efficiency, automation and material circularity
• supply chain capability, capacity and flexible manufacturing that supports future industrialisation and UK competitiveness

The technologies in scope within this theme apply to any component, sub assembly or system involved in the manufacture of zero emission vehicles.

Projects must deliver outcomes that increase the competitiveness of manufacturing zero emission vehicles and their supply chains within the UK.

Theme 3: Future vehicle innovation – Software Defined Vehicles (SDV) and Electrical/Electronic (E/E) architectures

Software Defined Vehicles (SDV) and Electrical/Electronic (E/E) architecture is focused on enabling features through software and involves a major paradigm shift and redesign across the electrical and electronic architectures.

This transformation is critical to supporting zero emission vehicle functionality and leveraging UK innovation strengths for global competitiveness.

This is system, vehicle and process level evolution in one or more of the following areas:

• delivering features faster, through a shift to rapid software native tools and processes adapted to meet automotive safety and security requirements (software factory)
• innovations in embedded software development and connectivity to enhance performance, safety, and time to market
• development of advanced control systems software and platforms, including software and control systems integration
• scalable and flexible future E/E architectures, communication systems, and high performance compute including their systems, components, sensors and actuators
• vehicle and system level simulation, including the use of digital twins and in the loop (xIL) innovations to enable rapid simulation, optimisation, and validation of interconnected systems
• innovations in the safe and secure use of AI in the functional software
• innovations in tools, processes and design practices for SDV and E/E architectures, including AI driven approaches for development, validation and optimisation

Projects will not be funded where they:

• focused on business processes not directly involved in the design, test, validation, recycle or reuse or manufacture of vehicles, for example, company back office systems and infrastructure
• including the design, development, integration, use, test or direct manufacturing of automated driving systems (ADS)
• only focused on the development of clean fuels
• not aligned with the UK net zero research innovations framework
• developing solutions such as e-Scooters or e-Bikes, although two wheel is in scope

Project duration

18 to 36 months

Must start on 1 May 2027

Award value

Grant funding request between £2.5 million and £20 million

Projects must be at least 50% match funded.

Funding rates

For industrial research projects, purposeful research that builds new knowledge and skills to improve or develop products, processes or services, often through prototypes or system components that validate ideas in realistic settings, organisations can receive funding for eligible project costs of:

• up to 70% if you are a micro or small organisation
• up to 60% if you are a medium sized organisation
• up to 50% if you are a large organisation

For experimental development projects, which use existing knowledge to shape and refine new or improved products, processes or services through prototyping, testing and validation, and are nearer to market, organisations can receive funding for eligible project costs of:

• up to 45% if you are a micro or small organisation
• up to 35% if you are a medium sized organisation
• up to 25% if you are a large organisation

Research organisations can share up to 30% of the total eligible project costs.

Eligibility criteria

• Projects must be collaborative and led by a UK registered business of any size.
• Projects must include at least one grant claiming SME.
• Collaborators can be a UK registered business of any size; an academic institution; a charity; a not for profit; a public sector organisation; or a research and technology organisation (RTO).
• Subcontractors should be preferably UK-based, with fully justified and appropriate costs. Overseas subcontractors are permitted where applicants can demonstrate why suitable UK subcontractors could not be used.
• All funded project work must be carried out within the UK.
• Organisations must intend to exploit the project results from or within the UK.
• Subsidy control and State aid rules apply under the Subsidy Control Act 2022.
• A 3.5% industrial contribution is payable to the APC by all partners on grant received.