Scottish Enterprise (SE) support for Boston Networks: FOI release

FOI reference: FOI/18/02337
Date received: 27 August 2018  
Date responded: 21 September 2018

 

 

• How £2.7m can be awarded to Boston Networks without procurement.
• To understand the vendor selection process.
• To have visibility of the business case and to understand the tariffing on the network.
• To understand how this complies with State Aid.

1.       I enclose a copy of some of the information you requested.
2.       To answer your questions:

Procurement: Scottish Enterprise (SE) provided Boston Networks, one of their account managed firms, with support to assist the expansion of their operations and growth by extending a sensor network open to academics, start-ups, established SMEs and, potentially, public sector users. This funding was provided to Boston on the same basis that SE funds any of its account managed companies.

Vendor selection: As with other account managed SMEs across Scotland, Boston Networks sought support and investment from Scottish Enterprise for a research and development proposal.

Business Case: The Scottish Government does not hold the business case from Boston Networks or details of their tariffing. Scottish Enterprise account manages Boston Networks they are project managing the IoT Scotland initiative. In the first instance, please contact their project manager Samuel Smith (Samuel.Smith@scotent.co.uk)

State Aid Compliance: as noted above, Scottish Enterprise is providing support to one of their account managed businesses. In this case, the investment equates to 50% of the eligible project costs under the GBER article 25 R&D Funding and article 26 Aid for Research Infrastructure. Following detailed scrutiny, Scottish Enterprise has assessed the costs as being eligible and therefore the level of support provided is compliant with current State Aid regulations.

4. While our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in this instance the Scottish Government does not hold the Business Case from Boston Networks which you have requested. The reasons why we don’t have the information are explained below.

The Scottish Government does not have the information.

The Scottish Government does not have the information you have asked for because the IoT Scotland Programme is project managed by Scottish Enterprise and have a direct relationship with Boston Networks as their account managers. Boston Networks took the IoT Scotland Programme to Scottish Enterprise for consideration for support as a Research and Development project.

This is a formal notice under section 17(1) of FOISA that the Scottish Government does not have the information you have requested.  

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