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Funding services
Introduction
Grants, soft loans and awards can be valuable sources of funding for your business or organisation. But where can you get them? Mackintosh Consultants has a broad knowledge of funding sources and programmes and considerable experience of bid writing and assessment. There are many UK and European schemes and initiatives that businesses and academics can apply to for funding. In the UK, these are usually backed by the Government (DTI), by one of the research councils or by Business Link, whereas for Europe the primary source of funding is the European Union.
Bid preparation is always incredibly labour intensive and there is never enough time to do a really first class job that will secure the contract. Very few, if any, companies, whether large or small, have sufficient staff with the right expertise immediately available to undertake this skilled and frenetic task.
With all significant UK Government, European and many other large company contracts going to competition, bid preparation and assessment is absolutely critical to the success of a company in the modern world!
European funding
Much of our funding activity has concentrated on advising and assisting companies, universities, research organisations and administrative bodies who wish to participate in the European Union's research programmes (especially the Framework Programmes). We have almost twenty years experience in EU research programmes, working for both proposers and the European Commission themselves, and we have managed over a dozen EU projects.
learn more about European funding»
UK funding
We have also sought out UK funds for a number of clients and helped them obtain grants and awards from several 
programmes. As in other countries, many UK grants are location specific. There are several schemes that operate across the whole of the UK, but in addition to these there are a myriad of schemes that are administered locally.
The location of your business will be absolutely crucial, and funding that might be available to you will be strongly dependent on the area into which you intend to grow or develop. Additional support may be available to a business investing in or into an area of social deprivation, particularly if it involves sustainable job creation.
UK companies investing in R&D should be aware of the tax breaks available through the UK Government R&D tax credit scheme.
Other funding services
We can assist in other ways of raising capital to allow the expansion of your business. By working through Mackintosh Consultants, companies can delegate the very time consuming task of writing, submitting and distributing a business plan or funding request to potential investors or funding bodies, and so avoid losing focus on their business.
A realistic and persuasive business plan is essential to both successfully operate a business and obtain injections of capital to help a business grow, but this is often not a task that companies and entrepreneurs are practised in – other than perhaps via an annual planning cycle.
Mackintosh Consultants has considerable experience in the creation of business plans and the raising of funds in both the UK and USA, yielding over £20m in equity and debt financing. Venture Capitalists and other investors tend to have limited time and be deluged with opportunities, so it is essential that a business plan be exciting, convincing and brief in order to lead the investor into making further enquiries and requesting meetings with client companies.
Contact us for more information – if you are planning to submit a proposal, remember that you will be competing with other proposals which have been professionally prepared, so make sure yours is too by enlisting our help!
