College of Science & Engineering

Background

Over recent years, funding calls have become more bespoke and complex and often involve multiple Co-Investigators and partners. This requires additional time to review and understand the terms and conditions, liaise with Co-Is and partners, to allow us to maximise the budget available for the PI and the income and contribution opportunities for the School and College. The College Research Support Team provides support to prepare application costings and submissions and currently provides a rapid response to late applications. However, this flexibility is eroded by the volume of late requests and limits the amount of time to add value to all applications. As a result, the quality of the service provided by the Research Support Team to the Principal Investigators is being adversely impacted by the volume of short leadtime application requests.

The table below shows the key steps in preparing an application costing and submission and the associated planning leadtimes. This shows that an application planning leadtime of 4 to 7 weeks should be built into the process to allow for all parties to plan and support the development, coordination and approval of the financial proposal and supporting documentation for submission of application to funder. Please note: If the funder provides shorter leadtime, all parties will work collaboratively to walk the application through the process, within the leadtimes provided.

Next steps

• PIs are to engage with the College Research Support Team a minimum of 4 weeks, ideally 7 weeks, ahead of the funding deadline. Engage means let the Research Support Team know of the intention to submit on a specific date with details of the specific call.
• If PIs repeatedly do not engage at least 4 weeks before submission deadline (except where funder lead times are less than 4 weeks), their work will not be prioritised and there is a risk that financial approval may not be completed, and the application cannot be submitted to the funder.
• Applications with a lead time of less than 5 working days before the deadline will not be processed except in very extraordinary circumstances and only with approval by the Head of College Research Support and Head of School.

Project Planning Leadtimes

The College of Science and Engineering's Research Support Service includes Research Development Managers (link) who can help research staff:

• identify relevant funding opportunities
• develop research proposals
• make connections with a view to strengthening your proposal.

Visit the Develop your research career pages to find out about support for Early Career Researchers.

Contact the Research Support Service (link to form) or your Project Coordinator (PC) for information, support and guidance.

The Capex process applies to individual items of equipment >£50k including vat (unless building a single asset from multiple components).

1. Please email capex-support@glasgow.ac.uk with details of your proposed purchase, the proposed location and to request the CAPEX questionnaire.  Estates & Commercial Services must conduct an independent review of the proposed equipment and their response is added to section 8 of the form.  A datasheet, if available, can help to speed up their review.
2. Please complete the ‘Investment Application Form’ found at the link below if the total University contribution is <£500k.  Focus on the start of the form & section 4 (benefits).  Should you require help to populate any parts email Drew Beaton, Research Accountant at drew.beaton@glasgow.ac.uk for support. You can find more information on the Finance Investments page. Please include the cost of the equipment including VAT and the % of funding available. 
   
   When you have the final version of your Investment form (2) please email it to Drew Beaton, Research Accountant at drew.beaton@glasgow.ac.uk who will arrange approval of the Investment form by Head of College / Head of Finance. If the total University contribution is >£500k, it would need to be submitted to Investment Committee for formal approval.

Grant Applications to cover Equipment Costs

Individual items, £3k to £10k

Individual items of minor research equipment from £3k to £10k (£8.33k ex VAT) should be included in "Other Directly Incurred costs".

Individual items, £10k to £138k

All items of equipment costing between £10k (£8.33k ex VAT) and £138k (£115k ex VAT) require further justification – evidence of an evaluation of the use of existing relevant capital assets. The percentage funding for such equipment varies depending on funder and scheme.

When scoping your application consult with your Head of School/Director of Research as soon as possible. There are financial and space implications for the School that must be assessed. They will need to be aware of any potential additional costs to the School and to approve them before proceeding.

Items above £138k

Items above £138k (£115k ex VAT) will require a business case. This should be two pages outlining the strategic need for the equipment. UKRI will decide the strategic location for these items and will potentially fund them at 100 per cent. For more details on equipment funding please visit: UKRI guidance

Applications for strategic equipment funding

This guidance is focussed on support for applications to the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) for strategic equipment, however, many of the points will also be relevant when applying for other types of UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) equipment funding.

There are various UKRI schemes available:

EPSRC strategic equipment

“Strategic equipment is intended to enhance UK scientific capability and support a portfolio of high quality, cutting edge research of high priority to EPSRC. The request should fit with the host university strategy and enable research that predominantly falls within EPSRC’s remit.”

EPSRC strategic equipment is an open call with panels three times a year (around January, May, September). They will consider applications from £400k up to several million, but advise if estimated costs are over £3M to consult with EPSRC in advance of application.

The scheme funds equipment with a local, regional, national or community strategic need.

Process

Appling for EPSRC strategic equipment has several stages that are different from applying for a standard research grant.

Pre-application

Before applying you should contact your Project Coordinator and your Research Development Manager to let them know you are thinking of applying. You should also discuss your application with the School and apply for investment committee approval. These must be completed before an external application can be submitted.

Gaining School support for the application

You should discuss the following points with your Research Director and Head of Technical Services (or equivalent) to ensure the School is happy to support the application and provide appropriate resource.

• What is the level of strategic importance? Eg Local, regional, national
• What is the need? What research will be enabled? What is the new capability? How fair and inclusive is your intended access model?
• How does this kit fit with existing equipment, School strategy and research ambitions?
• Who are the user base? Internal and external
• What are the alternatives to buying this?
• What staffing is required, both technical and academic (consider requirements for procurement, set up, installation, training, process development, running samples, maintenance, marketing, building collaborations)? Are the School willing to contribute any of the costs or will they have to be fully recovered through usage charges? Are there people available to staff it? Research Technical Professional (RTP) posts are encouraged on EPSRC Strategic Equipment grants so consider appointing one for the duration of the grant. RTPs are postdoctoral level members of staff that can support the install, set up, marketing and developing collaborations.
• Sustainability (financially, staffing and user base)
• Where will it be located? This will need agreed with the School.
• Is this going into a wider facility or set up?
• EPSRC have no current mandatory requirement for cash contribution, but encourage applicants to consider contributions eg a direct contribution towards the equipment,
  in-kind investigator time, funding an RTP, contributing refurbishment costs. This should be discussed with the School.
• What is the long term plan for this equipment? If you want it to appear on the School SPR or capital replacement plan you will need to discuss this with the School and Drew Beaton.

The investment committee approval process

All capital equipment (over £50k including VAT) must go through- the investment committee approval process. If the University of Glasgow's contribution is >£500k the proposal goes to full committee approval. If it is <£500k it is approved at College level.

This process is led by Drew Beaton, College Research Accountant and it requires:

• Estates and Buildings to assess the location and provide a quote for installation (email capex-support@glasgow.ac.uk)
• a business case and financial information.

Preparing your case

Due to the multiple stages of this process there are a number of things that you should consider as early as possible. You should read the assessment criteria for each stage carefully to see which area to focus on in each document.

• What level is the strategic importance? (E.g. Local, regional or national.) The guidance pages have information on the different levels of strategic need. It is better to have a very strong case for a lower level strategic need than a weak case for a higher one.
• Be very clear on why this kit is required, include details of what it will deliver (e.g. new capability, improvements to processes, higher throughput) and what new research will be enabled
• Fit to EPSRC strategic priorities (research area strategies, grand challenges, cross-theme priority and prosperity outcomes) and how this will contribute. Are there any external strategies or roadmaps that this contributes to
• What are the alternatives to buying this?
• What is the capacity? What is the realistic level of usage can you expect? (E.g. 24h or 8h a day, 5 days or 7 days a week.) Think about downtime throughout the year.
• Identify your user base clearly. Who will be your main user group? What percentage will be internal, external, academic, industrial? How will you grow the user base and contact potential users? Think about your plans for marketing and reaching users. This may be through visits to events/conferences, directly visiting potential groups, inviting people to come and use the equipment for free as a trial etc? How will you ensure fair access for ECRs, PhD students etc? This could be through reduced charges, or an agreed number of free runs/samples for ECRs. Are there users who will write you letters of support demonstrating their need for this equipment?
• Consider what level of staffing is required, both technical and academic (consider requirements for procurement, set up, installation, training, process development, running samples, maintenance, marketing, building collaborations)? Who will work on this? You should have agreed this at school approval stage. If you are planning to appoint an RTP then do you have a person in mind or will you have to recruit? When do you need them start?
• Sustainability. EPSRC want to see that the equipment is sustainable in terms of finances, staffing and user base. You should show plans for recovery of running costs (maintenance, repairs, consumables, staff time) during and beyond the lifetime of the grant and demonstrate that you will develop an appropriate charging model. Think about how you will staff the equipment and develop the specialist technical staff beyond the duration of the grant. Show how you plan to sustain and grow a diverse and inclusive user base. Consider the mix of different types of users, students, ECRs, industry, internal academic staff, external academic staff, etc. A good balance of these shows that you are not reliant on a small pool of users. How will you target these users? (E.g. attend events, run events, publicise through networks etc.)
• Where will it be located? This will need agreed with the School.]]How does this kit fit with existing equipment, School strategy and research ambitions?
• Can you tie in the ARC (access to broader user base etc), the wider University research beacons and strategy, other University facilities (does it complement extend capability of any of these? Think about the environment it’s going into.
• Consider the Technician commitment and researcher concordat, how will you support the career development of the people who support the equipment? If you appoint an RTP what is their future career pathway?
• Management and governance. Who will be responsible for the equipment? Will you have a management group, steering group, user group? If so who will sit on these?

Business case

Your business case should be a two page document with the following headings: Full details and assessment criteria can be found on the UKRI website.

• Name of the principal investigator (PI).
• Name of the host institution.
• Item or items
• Vendor
• Description
• Costs (can only deviate by 10% from outline to full proposal)
• Usage
• Support
• Strategic case
• Ensuring maximum valueContribution from other sources
• Alternatives

The business case is assessed internally by EPSRC staff. Research Development Managers within the College of Science and Engineering (CoSE) can assist you in writing your businees case and can also review your document before submission to EPSRC.

Full proposal

If you are invited to full proposal stage you are required to submit the following documents.

• Case for support (8 sides of A4)
• Business case
• Justification of resources
• Work plan
• Statements of support from project partners
• Letter of support from key users of the equipment
• Host organisation statement
• Equipment quotations
• Summary of equipment quotes

College Research Development Managers can assist you in writing and reviewing this document. Full details, page limits and assessment criteria can be found on the UKRI website.

Interview

If you are invited to interview, you will need to prepare by:

• considering who will attend the interview (Up to three people can attend and at least one must attend the meeting in person. One attendee should be a senior representative of the University of Glasgow such as the Head of College or Dean of Research. The other two could be the PI, a key user, a research facility manager or research technical professional.)
• briefing anyone who has not been involved in preparing the proposal before the interview
• preapring a short summary of the application that you are required to provide at the beginning of the interview
• contacting the Research Support team to request external pitch training and/or mock interview(s)
• making a slide deck of expected questions and your answers.

Example interview questions:

• What research will be enabled by this equipment?
• What is unique about the equipment that will lead to this world-changing research?
• What will you do if you don’t get this funding?
• How have you considered the sustainability of the equipment?
• Can you explain the usage numbers for your instruments? 170 days – where does that come from?
• How will you make sure that any instrument time at no cost is used equitably?
• How will you prioritise usage and balance between internal/external/industrial? Consider non paying users such as students.
• A lot depends on your RTP facility manager. What happens if they leave?
• Can you explain how this fits with University strategy?
• How did the University decide its level of contribution to the proposal?
• Can you explain the roles of the investigatory team?
• How will you help the RTPs in their career development?
• Is there scope for industry to use this equipment?
• Which research areas will benefit from the equipment? How will the equipment contribute to the strategic direction of these areas?
• What does 100% usage mean?
• Is the balance between internal and external usage appropriate?
• How will you be proactive about attracting new users?
• How will it be managed? Will there be a steering committee?
• What will be the scientific impact?
• Explain the cost and charging model? What does this include?
• How will this be delivered on time and to specification?

Tender and Procurement

The value of Strategic equipment means the Find A Tender Service procedure applies, run by the Procurement Office. https://www.gla.ac.uk/myglasgow/procurementoffice/.Refer to the Procurement Strategic Sourcing Journey for details of the steps involved (page 14 of Procurement Policy) https://www.gla.ac.uk/media/Media_771396_smxx.pdf).

The first action is to submit a Start Tender Process form to procurementhelpline@glasgow.ac.uk to begin the process. Our College Procurement Category Manager, Stephen Otiende (Stephen.Otiende@glasgow.ac.uk), will then be in touch to support you through specifying, running and evaluating your tender, and ensure that it complies with all public procurement legislation.

Some advice from a colleague who has recently gone through the tender process:

• Include everything in the tender that you need to get the equipment up and running on installation, think about things like chillers, gas generators etc. Evaluation is only based on what is in the tender specification so make sure everything that matters is in there.
• Think hard about which aspects are important and make sure that the weighting is appropriate. Your award is a fixed amount so it is better to get the best possible instrument for the money you have. Consider the balance between cost and technical specification to maximise value for money.
• Try to find some criteria allow real differentiation between different quality or suitable offers.

Recruitment

EPSRC Strategic Equipment grants allow you to appoint a Research Technical Professional (RTPs are postdoctoral level members of staff that can support the install, set up, marketing and developing collaborations). If you request funds for this person their post will only last for the duration of the award.

Standard recruitment procedures will apply, as detailed in the Recruitment Toolkit https://www.gla.ac.uk/myglasgow/humanresources/recruitment/recruitmenttoolkit/.Your PC will provide you with costs and CoSE recruitment team (Peter Blyth scieng-recruitment@glasgow.ac.uk) can advise you on the process.

After purchase

There are a number of things that will take place after purchasing your equipment and you should consider who will manage these. These include:

• Estates and Building works (if required)
• Delivery, installation, set up and any calibration or process development required
• Any training that is to be done by the supplier and subsequent user training (if this is done separately
• Developing a charging and access model, and associated internal processes
• Marketing the equipment internally and externally. Internally we can publicise using newsletters, websites (School, College and University level), launch events etc. Externally you may wish to plan visits to external users or events. You should also list the equipment on the UKRI database (see Linsey Robertson).
• Processes for monitoring and recording usage
• Setting up and chairing a steering group
• Sustaining, growing and diversifying the user base
• Maintenance of the equipment
• Training new users
• Monitoring usage for EPSRC reporting

Recent successful applications (CoSE)

• Dr Mark Symes (Chem), Prof. Nikolaj Gadegaard (Eng), Prof. Martin Lee (GES) Dec 2021
• Prof. Edward Wasige (Eng), Dr Chong Li (Eng) July 2021. Proposals available on request.
• Prof. John Marsh (Eng) and Prof. Miles Padgett (P&A) have been on the EPSRC panel in recent years.
• Prof. Doug Paul and Dr Claire Wilson sit on the EPSRC Capital Equipment Strategic Advisory Team.