Henry Royce Institute invites tenders to formulate advanced ceramics roadmap
The Institute is looking for a clear, evidence-based picture of the UK’s advanced ceramics landscape and future priorities.
Advanced ceramics are vital across the eight growth-driving sectors identified by the UK’s Modern Industrial Strategy, including advanced manufacturing, clean energy industries, life sciences and defence.
The UK has strengths across its ceramic materials supply chain, particularly from intermediate materials through to product manufacture, but there are gaps in its ability to secure and commercialise IP and provide supply chain resilience in global markets.
Henry Royce says the UK’s innovation in technical ceramic materials needs to be accelerated, captured and scaled to ensure a competitive sector is maintained, and there is also a need to protect, de-risk and enable supply chains to industrialise and commercialise these ceramics and process technologies.
A roadmap for the sector will align the UK’s capabilities, provide focus for high impact initiatives, improve competitiveness, de-risk investment, foster cross-sector collaboration and realise the tangible benefits of a thriving advanced ceramics sector.
The appointed organisation will build on roadmapping activities and stakeholder engagement already undertaken by Royce through its National Materials Innovation Strategy.
The project is expected to carry out an initial landscape and gap analysis, followed by a detailed national roadmap and implementation strategy.
It should establish an overarching vision for the sector; map the current UK landscape; identify gaps in capability, infrastructure and coordination; propose a national policy and coordination model; develop an implementation roadmap setting out milestones, investment pathways and stakeholder roles; assess how the roadmap compares with and complements related activities; and recommend mechanisms to connect research, technology development and scale-up.
The roadmap's delivery will be the appointed organisation’s responsibility, but will be overseen, monitored and guided by a Royce-appointed Steering Group. This group will, in turn, report to the Materials Innovation Leadership Group.
The procurement process for the UK Advanced Ceramics Roadmap is managed by The University of Manchester, UK, and all submissions must be made through the University’s In-Tend tender management platform.
Prospective applicants must register or log in to express interest, access the full tender documentation and submit a response. Any questions or requests for clarification must also be submitted through the In-Tend platform.
Tender applications opened on 29 July 2026 and will close on 14 August 2026 at 12pm GMT. The expected contract award date is 21 August 2026, project start date is 1 September 2026 and project completion is 31 January 2027.
