Innovate UK Grant and Award

Innovate UK has selected our founder Lia to receive one of the 2022 Women in Innovation Awards. Lia is one of 38 pioneering female entrepreneurs who were announced as this year’s winners on 8th March, in celebration of International Women’s Day.

Each award comes with financial backing of £50,000 as well as specialised mentoring and coaching for the recipient to grow their business. Lia will use this support to accelerate the development of chipscale optical inertial sensors, working in partnership with Compound Semiconductor Applications (CSA) Catapult and their advanced packaging team.

Innovate UK is part of UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), the government body dedicated to fostering an active research community and facilitating the development of disruptive technologies.

The flagship Women in Innovation Awards is a key part of Innovate UK’s commitment to boosting the number of UK female entrepreneurs. As highlighted in the Alison Rose Review of Female Entrepreneurship, enabling women to start and scale businesses at the same rate as men could add up to £250 billion to the UK economy.

Now in its fourth year, Innovate UK’s Women in Innovation programme continues to support high-potential female business leaders from diverse backgrounds. This year, over a third of the winners are Black, Asian or from another ethnic minority group, 16% have identified as disabled, and there are award winners in every nation and region of the UK.

You can read more about the awards and some of this year’s other recipients here: https://www.ukri.org/news/uks-top-women-game-changers-get-government-backing/