NESTA announces over £3.5 million for UK innovators
Howard Lake | 2 July 2001 | News
The National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts is to make 46 new grants worth over £3.5 million to support UK innovators and entrepreneurs.
The awards go to an wide range of innovators – lone inventors, scientists, artists, educators, and engineers. New ideas for products and projects are equally diverse, including the application of radar mapping for breast screening, the use of laser technology to remove chewing gum from our streets, a method of restoring natural colour to grey hair and a ‘children’s palace’ to nurture creative talent in young people. There is also a diverse mix of arts pioneers – individuals who want to experiment and push the boundaries of a variety of art forms including opera, visual art, circus performance, dance, music, theatre, performance art and photography.
Jeremy Newton, Chief Executive of NESTA, said: “The individuals we’re funding range in age from their 20s to their 70s. What they all share in common has nothing to do with wealth, fame or educational qualifications – it’s simply the sheer freshness and ingenuity of their ideas. As well as offering vital lifelines to a wide range of inventions for products and services, the awards also support a new generation of architects, visual artists, composers, choregraphers, and performance artists.”
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NESTA was set up by Act of Parliament in 1998. Its income, about £10 million a year, comes from the interest from an endowment of £200 million from the National Lottery that was committed to establish, what is, the UK’s first and only national endowment. Its mission is to support and promote talent, innovation and creativity in science, technology and the arts.
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.