In September 2015 Innovate UK and SENAI (Serviço Nacional de Aprendizagem Industrial or National Service for Industrial Training) in Brazil announced a call for submissions where they were planning to invest up to £3.4 million in collaborative industrial research and development projects that propose new commercial solutions to critical socio-economic challenges that Brazil faces in its energy, water and waste sectors.

The objective of this competition was to foster and support the development of industrial collaborative research and development (R&D) projects that bring together businesses, and potentially research organisations, academics and other collaborators from Brazil and the UK for the joint development of innovative products, processes or services that meet particular challenges that Brazil is facing in its growth and development trajectory.