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Technological advance: To utilise a polyacrylamide gel, currently used to treat women’s incontinence, and adapt it to permanently treat the cause of osteoarthritis in animals by promoting the regrowth of soft tissue.
Technological uncertainties included:

• It was unknown to what extent the polyacrylamide gel would effectively integrate with, and cushion, the joint and therefore whether it would be a viable treatment.

• The developers had to thoroughly study whether the gel would interact with any other drugs, what impact these reactions would have, and how dangerous they could potentially be.

• The long-term effect of the gel had to be studied to ensure that it would still be an effective treatment over a period of multiple years, without any harmful side-effects.

• The treatment would have to be tested thoroughly to ensure that it would meet Veterinary Medicines Directorate guidelines and standards.

Value of the claim for the client: £72,044.06 (tax credits and creation of losses)
Value of the claim for the accountant: c. £2,881

Technological advance: The creation of an engine test rig with significantly improved characteristics (lead time, operating ranges, dynamic performance etc.) while achieving the ability to be utilised with a range of different engine types over a significant lifetime.

Technological uncertainties included:

• Defining an architecture that would be compatible with all past, present and impending future engine types and control system architectures.

• Identifying and sourcing a suitable combination of components that would be able to meet the full suite of technical requirements (e.g. operating ranges, dynamic performance, accuracy, ability to self-calibrate).

• Being able to develop a complementary software architecture that would be robust and configurable to meet all engine requirements.

Value of the claim for the client: £89,792 (tax saving)
Value of the claim for the accountant: c. £3,591

Technological advance: The company sought to automate the process of photo-meter reading detection via the development implementation of an automated machine-learning algorithm within its smartphone application. This would be achieved through the development of a series of mixed-architecture deep neural networks, trained on independent components of tasks where predictions were fed downstream to other detectors.

Technological uncertainties included:

• Generating an algorithm capable of imagery detection which could make detection in the presence of partial or obscured low-quality images and make the decision to make no detection in the case where the photo is ambiguous or of the wrong thing.

• Establishing the correct architecture for the solution in order to reduce false positives.

• Developing a solution capable of recognising different camera angles and low-quality imagery where the image was still correct.

• Integration within the solution to generate billing data.

Value of the claim for the client: £185,238.22 (tax credit)
Value of the claim for the accountant: c. £7,409

Technological advance: A new modular method for constructing supermarkets which would include an aquaponic farming system on the roof. This would be achieved by the development of a new supermarket retail space/greenhouse interface and be the first time a retailer has attempted to construct a new-build supermarket with greenhouses on the roof, directly selling to consumers at the point of growth.

Technological uncertainties included:

• Establishing a method of controlling the heating and cooling elements to create a comfortable environment for shoppers, without having a detrimental effect on the quality of the greenhouse produce.

• Managing the heating and cooling system between greenhouse and supermarket in a mechanical/passive manner without the need for a large air extraction system.

• Ensuring the untested modular structural system is simple to assemble on-site with local builders and craftsmen.

Value of claim for the client: £215,058 (tax saving)
Value of the claim for the accountant: c. £8,602