40 businesses across Liverpool city region have successfully bid for funding from the £2.3m High Growth Innovation Fund. Tony McDonough reports

A total of 40 businesses across Liverpool city region have secured grants of between £25,000 and £75,000 from the High Growth Innovation Fund (HGIF).

Launched in May this year, the HGIF is part of the £6.6m LCR High Growth business support programme. The aim is to drive job creation, support technical innovation and accelerate economic growth.

Its predecessor, the Future Innovation Fund, provided £2.1m to 35 city region businesses during 2020 and 2021. This new fund is being delivered by Growth Platform, the city region’s economic development agency.

It will help businesses get new products or services to market or develop new processes to help them adapt and grow. The latest awards were made across six city region priority areas: health innovation, digitalisation, culture, zero-carbon, sustainable industry and ‘tech for good’.

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Successful projects range from a system that’s helping to make shipping more fuel efficient, to paint recycling, and a scheme that turns waste food into health products. Other winning projects include a digital wellbeing support system for new parents.

Steve Rotheram, Metro Mayor of the Liverpool City Region, said: “SMEs are the cornerstone of our economy, accounting for 99% of all businesses in our region. They’re essential, not only to our current success, but to our long-term economic prosperity.

“I want to harness the expertise here in our region and establish ourselves as a leader on the global stage. We are going to support the industries of tomorrow to expand, helping us create well-paid, secure jobs and training opportunities for local people.

“We can only achieve that by empowering our SMEs to grow and succeed. I’m hoping this investment will help to unleash their full potential. Our region is already home to one of the country’s most advanced tech clusters in the country.

“The appetite for their services is only going to grow as we become an increasingly technological society.”