UK Shared Prosperity Fund Business Grants
The UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF or the Fund) is a central pillar of the UK government’s ambitious Levelling Up agenda and a significant component of its support for places across the UK.
UKSPF Business Sustainability Grant
North Lincolnshire has been allocated funds through the UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF) as part of the Levelling Up agenda. The fund will target where there is a need to create and build pride in place, support the business sector, and increase life chances through personal development and training to access employment. The fund will invest in three investment priorities: communities and place, support for local businesses, and people and skills.
North Lincolnshire Council is committed to delivering a clean, green economic future for the authority and the region and is looking to support our crucial economy to move towards this goal. We have launched our own commitment to a Green Future through our Green Futures plan and we are looking to ensure our businesses are able to join the journey and achieve a Net Zero economy by 2040. We recognise that the economic climate is a challenging one and support towards decarbonisation and de-risking investment needs to be made to achieve our collective goals which is the aim of this grant scheme.
The Business Sustainability Grants prime objective is to support businesses in reducing their energy related overheads whilst also seeking to reduce the regions CO2 emissions as a direct result. This will allow businesses to increase their profit margins, protect employment for residents of North Lincolnshire and our localised economy. Its aim is to support those businesses seeking to invest within the region; in technologies, products and services that will directly reduce their energy consumption, reducing their overheads and CO2 emissions by offering financial incentives directly to support and promote these investments. This grant scheme is designed to allow businesses to invest in the short term for their longer-term sustainability and support the UK government to achieve a Net Zero economy by 2040.
The fund is split between two distinct streams, covering capital investment and revenue costs. The revenue strand will enable businesses to access independent expert advice in understanding their own energy costs, assess/undertake feasibility studies into possible solutions and costs associated with installing equipment/technologies. The capital element of the grant will cover the investment in products/machinery deemed to help support the reduction in CO2 emissions.
The maximum grant per business will be £5,000 and the minimum grant per business will be £500. The investment ratio will be considered as part of the application process and is governed by the UK Subsidy Allowance Rules – for full details on what the intervention rate is for your business, please read the detailed guidance document.
Typical projects could be:
- Installation of LED lights throughout the business property
- Installations of solar panels on roofs for generation on behalf of the business
- Replacement of inefficient boiler to a modern, hydrogen ready boiler
- Feasibility studies into where a business could look to invest to reduce their CO2 emissions.
To be eligible, the business activity must be based within North Lincolnshire, the business must have been trading for a minimum of 12 months and prove that they have a UK based bank account in the name of the entity applying for funding.
UKSPF Digital and Marketing Grant
North Lincolnshire has been allocated funds through the UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF) as part of the Levelling Up agenda. The fund will target where there is a need to create and build pride in place, support the business sector, and increase life chances through personal development and training to access employment. The fund will invest in three investment priorities: communities and place, support for local businesses, and people and skills.
North Lincolnshire Council is aiming to support our local economy to access funding to help them adapt their business to deliver further growth maximising the use of digital technologies and/or raising their profile through marketing campaigns. We recognise that we are facing unprecedented economic challenges to businesses and the need to be able to invest in new technologies to remain competitive across a global landscape remains a fundamental pillar within our Economic Growth Plan vision. We have previously launched digital schemes during the COVID-19 pandemic that enabled business to invest, and we are seeking to build on this with further support.
The scheme is also closely aligned with the Government’s own Digital Strategy which was launched last year, which highlights ‘The UK’s economic future, jobs, wage levels, prosperity, national security, cost of living, productivity, ability to compete globally and our geo-political standing in the world are all reliant on continued and growing success in digital technology’.
The proposed scheme will offer both capital and revenue aid to businesses to help them invest and safeguard existing jobs but also seek to create further growth leading to new skilled employment opportunities for residents. The capital strand will seek to support in the investment of new hardware, software or improving businesses digital connectivity through broadband vouchers. The scheme will not support general IT purchases (such as laptops, iPads, tablets etc.) unless these can be directly linked to wider elements of a project. The revenue element of the grant can cover businesses purchasing digital marketing campaigns, use of consultants to assess how to improve the reach of the business and/or the installation of new technologies as part of the wider project.
The maximum grant per business will be £5,000 for capital projects, £10,000 for revenue projects and the minimum grant per business will be £500. The investment ratio will be considered as part of the application process and is governed by the UK Subsidy Allowance Rules – for full details on what the intervention rate is for your business, please read the detailed guidance document.
Typical projects could be:
- Purchase of new software to improve customer management journey
- Purchase of the installation of improved broadband to a business
- Purchase of bespoke IT equipment and software to deliver a new service/product
- Contribution towards a digital marketing campaign
- Procurement of marketing consultants to develop a new marketing strategy for a business looking at growing it’s clients reach
- Moving a current website from regional/national to an international marketing – to increase existing export potential
To be eligible, the business activity must be based within North Lincolnshire, the business must have been trading for a minimum of 12 months and prove that they have a UK based bank account in the name of the entity applying for funding.