Sustainable Futures Innovation Lab
On Wednesday, 10th December (12:00-17:30), Sustainable Futures will be hosting an Innovation Lab exploring real-world business and societal environmental challenges and innovation opportunities that could be delivered or informed through academic collaboration.
How will the Innovation Lab work?
- The Innovation Lab will bring together 3-5 organisations that are seeking to overcome a specific environmental challenge or to develop innovative products and services.
- The University will matchmake each organisation with a multidisciplinary team of academic researchers to help define the problem and generate solutions.
- Over the course of the facilitated workshop, each group will work through a dynamic, creative process – defining the problem and generating a range of solutions – before concluding with the optimal project, which will be pitched to our expert panel for seed funding.
- Successful pitches will secure seed funding to pay for academic expertise to develop the project plan and help overcome the organisation’s challenge.
Benefits of participation
- Secure Seed Funding: Pitch your co-designed project to an expert panel for a chance to win up to £10,000 to fund the research.
- Develop Long-Term Collaborations: Our goal is to grow these initial projects into larger, impactful research collaborations, with university support for future funding proposals.
- Access Expertise: Build new relationships with a diverse team of academic experts and learn from a trusted model for collaborative research.
Applying for the Innovation Lab
We are seeking non-academic partner organisations (large corporates, SMEs, public sector & VSCE sectors) that can:
- Share a high-level overview of the environmental sustainability challenge you wish to overcome with the help of academic experts in the field - this could be a business challenge/question/opportunity where academic input could add value.
- Commit 2-3 representatives to attend the in-person workshop. To get the most out of the session we recommend you bring representatives who will be involved in overcoming the challenge if your project is funded e.g. technical staff if your problem is technical in nature.
When selecting Lab participants, consideration will be given to:
- Relevance of challenge to the Sustainable Futures areas of interest (see below) and alignment to our academic expertise.
- A clear focused challenge, meaningful to both academics and business/policy/civil society.
- Potential for and appetite to develop into a larger research collaboration.
- Matched funding or in-kind support to enhance the project's scope (not a mandatory requirement).
Our areas of interest
Our areas of interest include, but are not limited to, the following:
- Integrated and resilient energy systems that combine cutting-edge technologies, equitable governance and meaningful stakeholder engagement.
- Sustainable, equitable and innovative manufacture, use and remanufacture of materials.
- Environmental sustainability through a just transition that enables communities to thrive.
- Resilience to environmental change (physical and social infrastructure), whilst protecting, restoring and sustaining our natural environments.
- Reversing biodiversity loss and restoring ecosystems through integrated solutions to balance resource demands with ecosystem integrity.
- Inspiring our communities to address sustainability challenges through knowledge and skills.
If you have any questions regarding the relevance of your environmental challenge or want to discuss the opportunity more broadly, please contact Lucy.Latham@manchester.ac.uk to organise an informal chat.
Interested? Here’s How to Apply:
Complete the Expression of Interest form to submit your challenge by the 20th October 2025. If shortlisted, you will be invited to the Innovation Lab.
The Innovation Lab is an in-person workshop on Wednesday, 10th December (12:00-17:30) at the University of Manchester campus. Details will be confirmed with the official invitation.