Why work with us

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“Rob has been fundamental in the shaping and delivery of multiple successful grant applications for Theolytics, totalling more than £3M in funding. His ability to rapidly understand complex technical concepts is exceptional, and he has effectively collaborated with our team to develop content, navigate different grant processes and select strong strategic partners where required. Rob goes above and beyond every step of the way, facing every challenge with patience, and persistence.” 

Margaret Duffy, CSO and Co-Founder, Theolytics Ltd (Harnessing viruses to combat disease)

"Since 2019, Rob has supported us on several proposals, raising in the region of £3 million in grant funding. Rob is a pleasure to work with. He has listened to our company needs, understood our technology and what stage we are at, in order to target the best forms of funding for us. He always asks key questions to clarify and has done strong research to validate the market numbers and provide data to support our business case.” 

Mike Karim, CEO, Oxford Endovascular Ltd (Next-generation medical devices for neurovascular disease)

“Rob worked with us to develop our submission for an EIC Accelerator grant. The application was the most complex and comprehensive we have worked on and having Rob guide and support us through the process was invaluable.

Rob was able to grasp detailed technologies and help to organise business strategy into a clear plan.  He has excellent coaching skills that had us thinking deeply about the content of the application and used a number of tools to pull the logic together.  Throughout the lengthy duration of the process, Rob showed he could manage our anxieties, relentlessly keep on top of questions that needed answers and knew when to take a pragmatic approach to completing tasks.  He was on top of what needed to be done and essentially, wrote the submission.

It was a delight to work with him and would not hesitate to recommend Rob for a broad range of business support activities.”

Sumi Thaker – CEO, Momentum Bioscience Limited (Direct bloodstream infection diagnosis)

“When we first reached out to Rob, who came highly recommended from another company we knew, we were speculatively thinking of applying to a specific grant. Over that first call he listened carefully to what we did and could achieve, and directed us to another grant that he felt we would be better suited for. From that point onwards, he carefully guided the whole process from inception to submission - from finding and managing academic partners to writing the actual grant itself. His input and expertise were invaluable and we would not hesitate to recommend him to anyone, or to go back to him ourselves.”

Jolyon Martin – Co-Founder and ex-Head of Business Development, PetMedix Ltd (therapeutic antibodies for pets)

"Rob demonstrated exceptional levels of commitment to supporting the creation and submission of our Horizon 2020 application, providing clear guidance on how we might approach the structure and content. He got up to speed on the technology (a medical imaging AI) and the target market through a series of intense conference calls, surprising us by getting to grips with the complexities quickly. Throughout the process, Rob was unafraid to challenge us to verify the assumptions and claims we made as we iterated drafts of the documentation, helping us to produce a compelling and well-articulated proposal.” 

Andy Hill, ex-CEO, Fieldridge Limited

“We were looking for some help in developing a business-case type report on the opportunities of developing a Space-industry in the region. It was clear that this needed someone able to operate efficiently in an area with many unknowns, navigating stakeholders from industry, academia and government. 

Rob delivered this in an outstanding way, operating with a high degree of self-sufficiency, while staying bang on target with our requirements and delivering an exceptional report, shared as best-practise by our funders. 

I really enjoyed working with Rob, as he is quick to pick up concepts, brings in new ideas and delivers with minimum guidance. I am looking forward to the next time we can work together.”

Prof. Kai Bongs – Director of Innovation, University of Birmingham 

“Rob led on developing a business-case report on the opportunities for a future Space-industry cluster in the West Midlands region. He was an excellent communicator throughout and delivered the report on time to a very high standard. It was a pleasure to work with Rob and the overall project very much benefitted from his innovative ideas, attention to detail and efficiency. Any project team would be enhanced from having Rob on board and I hope very much that I have the opportunity to work with him again in the future.”

Dr. Chloe Billing – Research Fellow, City-REDI, Birmingham Business School, University of Birmingham.

“Thank you, on behalf of the team may I say how much your efforts have been appreciated - your help and guidance through this major exercise has been outstanding!” 

John Mawhood, CEO, RetinaScan Limited (AI-based automated retinal image analysis software)

“Framework Innovation was recommended to Converse Healthcare as a competent, experienced and reliable resource to support our first Innovate grant application for first in class medical device.

My engagement with Rob was through virtual meetings – which were very focused, as a result of Rob raising the questions to be discussed in advance resulting in thoughtful & probing dialogue with Rob. Through this process Rob was surprisingly quick to understand the technology, challenges and business drivers as well engaging with academic liaison personnel and other intersection points. Rob’s flexibility in coordinating “meetings” with all interested parties was exemplary and allowed for fluid informed information exchange – enabling all parties to support the submission with desired inputs.

The result of the collaboration was a timely submission for the grant, that reflected a thorough analysis of the medical device and business proposition articulated in a fashion that would best resonate with the reviewers of the application by framing the responses in a manner that would be more impactful. I have no doubt that our chances of success are better with Rob’s input.

I would recommend Framework Innovation to support grant applications and look forward to continuing our collaboration with Rob.”

Sanjiv Kanwar – CEO, Converse Healthcare Ltd

“Rob has provided top-notch support for the preparation of an Innovate UK grant. Despite my own grant writing experience, I was looking for an experienced grant specialist to help us lift our applications from ‘Good’ to ‘Excellent’ and Rob’s coaching has done exactly that. His knowledge of what the funder is looking for and how to ‘please’ the reviewers is impressive as is his attention to detail and perseverance in making sure that the message is conveyed in the right way. I will certainly use Rob’s services again at the next available opportunity and would wholeheartedly recommend him.”

Dr Gioia Cherubini – ex-Innovation Funding Specialist, Achilles Therapeutics UK Limited

“We at Cella have had the pleasure of working with Rob on an Innovate UK grant proposal submission, where he worked on our behalf to assist us in the development and submission of the proposal with our partners. Rob’s role was to learn into our technology and the opportunities that it provides in specific market sectors. He then helped us by generating initial drafts of the grant application, refining those drafts with our input, challenging our work programme (acting as devil’s advocate) and then taking charge of final edits from all partners, and ensuring that a full document set was submitted to the IUK portal before the deadline.

We feel that Rob added real value to our proposal, ensuring that the assessors will see a well thought through technology, business case and appropriate programme to realise innovation. He was always accommodating to our needs, worked independently much of the time but ensured that we always had sight of drafts in good time. He took a significant burden off of ourselves in terms of generating what we believe to be a first-class proposal.”

Chris Hobbs – Managing Director, Cella Energy Ltd (Hydrogen storage for transport and portable power)

"...we were looking for an expert advisor to support us in drafting a project proposal for InnovateUK. We spoke with approximately 20 firms and decided to work with Robert. During the first phone call it immediately became clear that Robert had a deep understanding of how to draft a solid project proposal and already gave us some useful advice. In the middle of August we sent the first draft of our proposal to Robert who provided us with very detailed and useful feedback a few days later. After receiving the written feedback we also had a telephone discussion where Robert clarified and further explained some of the improvements he suggested. After working with Robert, our proposal was more solid, [much] clear and has a significantly larger chance of acceptance…. Robert gave us his feedback in a very timely manner which allowed us to submit the final proposal in time. We will definitely consider working again with Robert in the future."

Jonas Poelmans – Chief Technology Officer, Clarida Technologies Ltd