Innovate UK has opened the Women in Innovation Awards for 2025 to 2026, with grants of up to £75,000 for as many as 60 winners.

HealthTech winners in 2024 included a tampon that prevents bacterial infections, an AI audio device for visually impaired people, and an app for gynaecological conditions.

The awards target female founders of late-stage start-ups with a minimum viable product, early user traction or revenue, growing teams and plans to raise significant capital within 12 to 24 months.

Liz Kendall, science secretary, said: “The Women in Innovation Awards are unlocking the UK’s untapped potential within our community of women innovators; if men and women started and scaled businesses at the same rate this could be worth as much as £250 billion for the UK economy.
“This record £4.5 million investment will empower ambitious women founders to scale their businesses, drive economic growth, and inspire the next generation of innovators.”

Applicants must operate in advanced manufacturing, digital and technologies, or life sciences, three of the high growth sectors identified in the UK’s Industrial Strategy. Winners receive up to £75,000 plus training, networking and role-modelling opportunities, with tailored support also offered to highly commended applicants.

The competition opened on 26 November 2025 and closes on 4 February 2026.

Since 2016, Innovate UK has invested more than £11m in 200 women innovators through these awards, with up to 60 more to be funded this year.

Last year’s programme drew criticism after Innovate UK initially said it would fund 50 women, then announced only 25 awards at £75,000 each. Following a campaign led by Emma Jarvis, founder of Dearbump, and the ‘Let’s Fund More Women’ group of more than 400 supporters, Innovate UK reversed the decision and confirmed all 50 awards and £4m, saying it was “a mistake and we prioritised wrongly”.

CardMedic, the digital platform transforming clinician and patient communication, has announced a major integration with LanguageLine Solutions, the global leader in on-demand interpretation.

The partnership brings one-click access to live, professional video and audio interpreters in more than 240 languages directly within the CardMedic app.

The integration will help clinicians deliver safe, inclusive, and human-centered care at the point of need.

Dr Rachael Grimaldi, co-founder and chief medical officer of CardMedic said: “Our mission is to remove barriers that stand in the way of safe, compassionate care.

“This integration with LanguageLine gives clinicians fast and reliable access to professional interpreters alongside all of CardMedic’s inclusive tools, making communication more effective and equitable than ever before.”

CardMedic’s digital app breaks down language, cognitive, and sensory barriers, providing clinicians with instant access to multilingual and multimodal tools that support patients across a wide range of communication requirements.

With LanguageLine’s trusted interpreter network now embedded into the platform, CardMedic becomes the only solution of its kind to combine prewritten clinical content, AI powered accessibility tools, and live interpretation in one seamless workflow.

CardMedic was quickly developed during the COVID 19 pandemic in response to urgent communication breakdowns caused by masks and PPE.

Since then, it has grown into a comprehensive healthcare language support platform, used across NHS trusts in the UK and expanding internationally into the United States.

Designed in collaboration with clinicians and refined through real patient feedback, the app is simple to use, fast to deploy, and built to fit within clinical workflows across acute, emergency, and routine care.

With the new integration, healthcare staff can connect to a live LanguageLine interpreter within seconds, directly inside the CardMedic app.

Whether a conversation starts with a multilingual script or with an AI powered sign language avatar, clinicians can now escalate immediately to human interpretation with no disruption to care.

The experience includes intelligent language selection, optional department code support, and device flexibility.

Early feedback from NHS and US health systems points to faster decision making, improved patient understanding, and reduced delays.

CardMedic’s AI is guided by a clinician in the loop model that ensures all content is accurate, culturally sensitive, and accessible at a 6 to 8-year reading level. The platform complies with GDPR, is tested to minimise bias, and is designed to complement human interpreters rather than replace them.

The result is a flexible, ethical, and scalable communication solution that strengthens understanding, safety, and trust across diverse patient populations.

CardMedic has been cited in NHS England’s 2025 Patient Safety Healthcare Inequalities Reduction Framework and supported by key innovation programs including the NHS Innovation Accelerator, Clinical Entrepreneur Programme, MassChallenge, and Texas Medical Center Innovation.

As healthcare systems continue to focus on reducing disparities, CardMedic’s all in one platform is uniquely positioned to support scalable, equitable care across urgent and planned settings.

Simon Yoxon-Grant, president and CEO of LanguageLine Solutions said: “When a clinician can connect with a patient in their own language, it affirms the patient’s right to be heard.

“We’re proud to work with CardMedic to deliver that kind of access at the point of care.”

Looking ahead, CardMedic is developing personalised interpretation pathways, digital consent support, and communication tools for underserved communities.