Receive up to £45,000 in funding, and become part of Invest Northern Ireland’s client portfolio
The next cohort of Ambition to Grow is opening for applications on Monday 21 August (at 12 midday) and closing on Friday 15 September 2023 (at 12 midday).
Invest NI is looking for Northern Ireland’s most innovative and ambitious businesses to join a new cohort of their Ambition to Grow competition. The competition offers businesses a chance to receive up to £45,000 in funding and ultimately become part of Invest Northern Ireland’s client portfolio.
Invest NI will provide support to create great jobs and sell your innovative products or services outside of Northern Ireland. They are looking for businesses that must:
- be ambitious, innovative businesses with a clear plan to grow sales to customers outside Northern Ireland
- have a product or service with a strong unique selling point to take to markets outside Northern Ireland
- be able to outline the potential for new employment within the business and demonstrate how these new roles will contribute to growth of the business into markets outside of Northern Ireland
- be able to demonstrate the need for government support for new employment and market development activities to take place
- have annual turnover under £1 million or sales to customers outside Northern Ireland of less than £300,000
Ambition to Grow is designed specifically to help micro, small and medium local enterprises to create jobs and grow exports.
Financial support
Funding will be awarded to applicants on a competitive basis. Applications will be assessed and scored, with the highest-scoring companies in each Invest NI region awarded funding following a successful validation interview.
A maximum of £45,000 is available for each successful application as follows:
- Up to £30,000 towards new employment within the business. The level of this support will depend on the number and type of new positions, the salary levels proposed and the number of hours each new role is contracted for.
- Up to £10,000 towards business development activities at a support rate of up to 50% of eligible costs which can include expenditure on market, product, or skills development.
- £5,000 on the completion of an Export Health Check, development of an Export Marketing Plan, and completion of an Innovate NI Self-Assessment.
Financial support payments are not up-front and are dependent on the execution of specific activities as outlined in any offer of support such as job creation or exporting.
This is a two-part application process, with the top-ranking online applications being invited for a face-to-face interview to validate the information provided in the application.
Ambition to Grow has been developed as a digital application to support businesses across the Invest NI regional office areas.
Who is eligible to apply?
This programme is primarily aimed at businesses that are not currently Invest NI customers. Businesses must meet all of the following criteria:
- The business must be based in Northern Ireland, with directors based in Northern Ireland.
- The business must be a small or medium-sized enterprise (SME).
- The business must provide a value-added commercial product and/or service.
- The business must be able to demonstrate that it is a viable business and will remain so for the duration of the project, with evidence that your business has sufficient resources to meet the match funding requirement.
- The business must currently have either an annual turnover of less than £1 million or annual sales to customers outside NI less than £300,000.
- The business must intend to create new employment over the next 1-2 years. If fewer than 3 new full time equivalent positions are proposed, at least one of the new roles must be a fulltime management position (30+ hours per week) contributing to growth of the business outside Northern Ireland and paying a minimum salary of £30,000.
- The business must intend to grow sales from customers outside NI.
- The proposed business activity must be a strategic fit with our current business strategy and aligned with the Department for the Economy’s 10X Economic Vision.
- The business must accept the completion of Invest NI customer due diligence checks on the business, including a credit check.
Who is not eligible to apply?
The following businesses are not eligible to apply:
- Businesses already in receipt of or intending to gain other government support for the project.
- Businesses that have an outstanding liability to Invest NI brought about through grant clawback proceedings. If a satisfactory repayment plan is in place, the business may submit an application for consideration.
- Businesses or any member of senior management within the business that is subject to a current bankruptcy order, Individual Voluntary Arrangement, Company Voluntary Arrangement, County Court Judgement, or Company Director Disqualification.
- Businesses involved in agricultural production, fisheries, and aquaculture (production and processing), steel, coal, shipbuilding, synthetic fibres, transport and infrastructure, tourism accommodation, energy (its generation, distribution and infrastructure) wholesale, retail (including online), and distribution.
- Applications which include or relate to activities that Invest NI considers as ineligible or as involving an unacceptable reputational risk, such as gambling, tobacco products and drug-based products, which are not authorised as medicines.
How to apply
An application form can be accessed by successfully completing the Eligibility Checker which will be available from midday on Monday 21 August 2023.
For more information, see Ambition to Grow guidelines (PDF, 278K) and Ambition to Grow FAQs (PDF, 189K) documents.
Deadline
The next cohort of Ambition to Grow is opening for applications on Monday 21 August (at 12 midday) and closing on Friday 15 September 2023 (at 12 midday).
Read more about Ambition to Grow
Source: nibusinessinfo