Consultancy for Innovation

Our consultancy services help companies and public agencies to plan, monitor and evaluate their activities in research, development and innovation. This includes:

• Strategy: Developing strategies and plans for IT-based innovation.

• Market Research: Gathering intelligence on technological developments, identifying and analysing market trends and developing marketing strategies and plans.

• Funding: Advice and support on accessing UK and EU grants and business funding.

• Implementation: Putting innovation and e-business plans into action.

• Evaluation: Monitoring and assessment of IT-related projects and programmes.

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Our Top Tips for Successful Innovators

The route from a good idea to a profitable innovation can be a long one. To take your idea from paper (or screen!) to reality requires hard work - and lots of it. Here are our top tips to being a successful innovator:

• Be clear about your aims: Prepare a business or project plan, develop a prototype or pilot, and ensure the product or service is market-ready through thorough testing and design. Often this can involve collaboration with a specialist or other organisation (see our factsheet).
• Create a "culture of innovation" across the company. Make innovation an intrinsic part of both your business strategy and your day-to-day operations. Ensure you lead, not follow, have a healthy flow of ideas and keep in touch with the market.
• Protect your idea through intellectual property so as to get the maximum value from your innovation efforts. In some cases open source can be a viable development route, provided you’re aware of the pros and cons (factsheet).
• Nurture your people: Talent is hard to come by, so it's more important than ever that businesses keep hold of their people. Develop the team, as well as the individual, and make effective use of freelancers and graduates (see factsheet).
• Know where the money is: Access to finance is the biggest barrier in innovation. Make sure you are familiar with all the types of funding available and are ‘investor ready’ (factsheet). R&D tax credits can also help (factsheet).

Please contact us to discuss how we could support your research, development and innovation activities.