Queen’s University of Belfast is renowned for its innovation strengths and has been ranked as the UK's #1 university for commercialising research for two consecutive years (2019 & 2020). Innovation programmes play an increasingly important role in accelerating the translation of research into commercial and societal impact.
Queen’s successfully delivers high-impact programmes across the island of Ireland, UK and Europe, for many of the key innovational agencies in those territories. From university focused research-to-commercialisation programmes, challenge-led programmes for specific sectors or scale-up innovation programmes for existing SMEs, Queen's, along with a vast network of partners, industry experts and mentors, Queen's is helping to build a innovation eco-system that is designed to tackle the urgent global, national and local economic & societal challenges we face.
CREATING THE PATHWAY FOR BREAKTHOUGH INNOVATIONS COME OUT OF THE LAB
Our vision at Innovation Programmes to help our researchers make an impact outside of the lab by bridging the gap between university research and the market. Our market discovery programmes are designed to support researchers refine and validate the commercial potential of their business idea, assess their product-market fit and receive feedback on their business readiness. We are passionate about building the foundations of sustainable businesses that will make a long-lasting impact on society.
INNOVATION PROGRAMMES ENTERPRISES:
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Student Enterprise
UNpreneur 4-week bootcamp
UNpreneur Inter-University Bootcamp 2023. Bootcamp kicks off on June 7th and is perfect for students who want to learn more about starting and growing a business. The bootcamp is made up of 4 weekly engaging, interactive and practical sessions designed to help students and graduates make progress on an existing or pre-start business idea. It is suitable for those at idea stage up to 2 years of trading. The Inter-University Bootcamp 2023 brings together students and graduates from universities across the UK to share experiences and work on developing their business ideas in a challenging and supportive environment. UNpreneur’s proven mentoring and entrepreneurial support and development techniques help turn ambitious students into innovative global change-makers; Whether they start their own business or make an impact working in an organisation.Lean Launch Programme
Lean Launch is a game-changing 10-week online customer discovery programme that allows you to rapidly test whether there is a market for products or services based on your research from the comfort of your workplace/home. The bespoke programme will offer 12 lucky students expert training, mentoring and coaching from an expert team. This programme can open up doors to investment, networks, IP expertise and further opportunities and has been transformative in terms of helping start-ups prosper in recent years. - Academic Enterprise
All our academic staff and students have access to the training and development programmes run by Queen’s University Belfast, in collaboration with external partners. The programmes are fully funded by QUBIS and third parties. We work closely with talented academics, ambitious entrepreneurs, astute investors and a host of industry experts to form successful spin–off companies that combine cutting–edge research and development with market–focused products and services.
"Innovation-to- Commercialisation of University Research" (ICURe)
Innovation-to-Commercialisation of University Research” (ICURe) is a 4-month full-time online customer discovery programme designed using lean start-up methodology and funded by Innovate UK. ICURe trains, funds, and supports teams led by university early-career researchers (ECRs) to determine whether there is a market for products or services that utilise their research, science, or technology. Up to £35,000 of funding is available to ‘get out of the lab’ and validate these commercially promising ideas in the marketplace.UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship (FLF)
Future Leaders Fellowships (FLF) is a cross-UK Research and Innovation scheme enabling fellows to tackle ambitious and challenging research and develop their own careers. It offers long-term, flexible support, including the fellow's salary and research, staff and training costs, plus the opportunity of a permanent academic position on successful completion of the fellowship. - Corporate Enterprise
The Innovation Programmes Team at Queens operate a growing number of corporate sponsored programmes and also programmes aimed at SMEs. Stimulating start-ups and Innovation Driven Enterprises (IDEs) will continue to be important, however, providing a support framework from both the private and public sector to help them survive and grow is now also crucial.
Agri- Food: EIT Food Seedbed Incubator
The pan-European EIT Food Seedbed programme is led by Queen’s and delivered in collaboration with leading EIT Food Partner Universities and Research and Innovation Organisations (Seedbed Hubs) from across Europe. Through knowledge transfer, Queen’s has provided their expertise in technology and product commercialisation to help these Hubs support entrepreneurs right across Europe to launch or progress a commercially viable business.Scaling The Edge (SMEs)
In collaboration with Innovate UK, Queen’s created an Intrapreneurship development Programme for SMEs based on a lean start-up methodology, design thinking, digital testing and data driven decision making. This methodology can radically change SMEs' approach to innovation thinking, particularly around new product development, product enhancement, and identifying new markets or applications for existing technologies and products.
Kainos- Sponsored Market Dsicovery
Kainos is our 'corporate sponsor' for pre-accelerator programme. Kainos uses technology to solve real problems for our customers, overcome big challenges for businesses, and make people’s lives easier. With expertise in Digital Services and their Workday Practice, Kainos works globally for clients across healthcare, commercial and the public sector to make the world a little bit better, day by day.They have:
- Create real-world impact.
- Engage with technical and industry experts
- Receive funding to carry out market testing
- Expand existing skillset into marketing and business.
- Explore new funding opportunities.
- Gain access to follow-on support and training in Investor Readiness, Licensing and other programmes.
Our customer discovery programmes can be corporate sponsored, and this is a growing area of interest. Our first-ever corporate sponsored programme, a DigiHealth Pre-Accelerator, was sponsored by Kainos (a QUBIS Spin-out), Pioneer Group and IUK. If you are interested in corporate involvement in our innovation programmes, email us.
- Digital Transformation
Working in collaboration with Technology Transfer Offices and investors across our diverse network, we are committed to driving not only economic, but also societal and environmental change through digital transformation. We aim to increase capabilities of TTOs; and help start-ups and spin-offs access funding by creating digital tools that will drive economic growth across our ecosystem
EIT HEI Initiative - Innovation Capacity Building for High Education (EntreUnity)
EntreUnity is a network of aspiring entrepreneurial European universities that concentrates on educating and training the next generation of agri-food, health and green-tech students in entrepreneurship and leadership. During this project a blue-print for a virtual TTO was developed. It focuses on early engagement with researchers and is complemented by automated workflows to alleviate administrative burden and increase capacities of TTO officers.
If you have queries reach out to:
Innovation Programmes
Programmes which are now open to APPLY!
BBSRC ICURe Explore
This 12-week BIOSCIENCE pre-accelerator programme is designed to providing the skills, networks and financial support to enable innovators, researchers and technicians to test and validate their idea. Your ICURe journey will culminate with the opportunity to reflect on your market discovery findings. Also, to help accelerate your research impact, an experienced panel of funders and stakeholders to guide you through your next step
ICURe Explore
This 12-week pre-accelerator programme is designed to support researchers through testing key market assumptions and market exploration activities, with the result of taking their breakthrough innovations out of the lab and transforming them into successful spin-outs! Participants will gain access to our team of experts and proactive connections to our network of entrepreneurs, investors and funders.
EIT Food Seedbed 2023
EIT food is the world’s largest and most dynamic food innovation community. EIT Food is supported by the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT), a body of the European Union. Plug into our EIT Food entrepreneurship powerhouse to maximise your chances to become a game changer. Launch, accelerate or scale your agrifood tech venture. We support you every step of the way with our three hands-on, equity free programmes.
PROGRAMMES SCHEDULE FOR 2023 (3,769 KB)
Case Studies
Working closely with the Commercial Development and QUBIS Teams, the Innovation Programmes Team have offered multiple initiatives that have resulted in licensed opportunities, stimulated start-ups and scaled Innovation Driven Enterprises (IDEs). Take a look at some examples.
Bia Analytical Ltd
They have developed industry-leading, cutting-edge methods to detect substitution or food adulteration across the supply chain, focusing on developing methods to detect adulteration in high-value or volume commodities such as herbs, spices, rice
GenoMe Diagnostics
GenoME Diagnostics is a spin-out company from the Patrick G Johnston Centre for Cancer Research at Queen’s University Belfast. It focuses on the development of novel tests for early detection of diseases, using an affordable and scalable platform.
VascVersa
Building on research at Queen’s University Belfast, VascVersa is developing a cell therapy product, Angicyte, which will address the underlying cause of the condition by promoting the formation of new blood vessels.
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