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The University Challenge Seed Fund

The purpose of University Challenge is to enable universities to access seed funds in order to assist the successful transformation of good research into good business. This early funding is the riskiest stage of the venture process, and many institutions experience a funding gap in the provision of finance for bringing research discoveries to a point where their commercial usefulness can be demonstrated and first steps taken to secure their utility. £45m was allocated in the first round of the competition in 1999, (with 15 seed funds being set up) and £15m more recently in October 2001 (which provided for an additional 4 seed funds, and 1 extension). 57 Institutions now have access to UC seed funding.

Although no further rounds of ring fenced university challenge funding are planned funding  in recognition of the importance of the University challenge concept, seed funding is now one of the strands of the core HEIF programme.

It is hoped to publish a table of results up to Nov 2005, once this year's annual reports have been returned and collated.