About The Greater Manchester AI Foundry

We are four universities who supported Greater Manchester SMEs to innovate and grow by connecting
them with cutting-edge AI research and knowledge.

Explore our partnership

With Manchester Metropolitan University leading the way, four universities from the North West: The Manchester Metropolitan University, Lancaster University, The University of Manchester and University of Salford teamed up to ensure 150 forward-thinking businesses were at the forefront of the evolution of Artificial Intelligence in Greater Manchester.

By sharing the knowledge and research from all four universities we aimed to help businesses accelerate through exploring the potential of adopting AI!

Our vision was fourfold:

  • To boost SME performance through the use of AI
  • Use AI research to act as an accelerator for new products and services
  • To add capacity to the GM tech ecosystem
  • Put Greater Manchester’s SMEs at the forefront of AI application nationally and internationally

This was a fully funded opportunity, with £3m funding from the European Regional Development Fund via the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Goverment, with partners delivering a further £3m in matched funding. The project provided innovation consultancy and advisory aid in line with the De Minimis Exemption and Innovation R&D aid in line with the General Block Exemption Regulation.

Greater Manchester AI Foundry will be a major contributor to both regional and national priorities, supporting the promotion and adoption of AI and helping Greater Manchester to build back better.”

PROFESSOR ANDY GIBSON, PRO-VICE CHANCELLOR OF THE FACULTY OF SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING AT MANCHESTER METROPOLITAN UNIVERSITY

Our Partnership

Our university partnership first came together with the launch of the Greater Manchester Cyber Foundry. The proven success of the Greater Manchester Cyber foundry lead to the four North West universities coming together again to help SMEs to grow and innovate through the adoption of Artificial Intelligence.

Our partnership specialisms

All the partners have core AI knowledge:

  • Deep learning and Neural Network Architectures
  • Machine learning
  • Image processing and computer vision
  • Text analytics, natural language processing
  • Big data and data science
  • Ethical AI and data privacy

Manchester Metropolitan University specialises in Big Data-Driven AI and Image Processing and Computer Vision.

The University of Salford specialises in Cost Sensitive Data Mining and Immersive Data Visualization. 

The University of Manchester specialises in in Text Mining and Natural Language Processing and Robotics and AI.

The Lancaster University specialises in Smart, Digital Materials for Product Funtionalisation using Additive Manufacturing / 3D Printing.

The project is providing innovation consultancy and advisory aid in line with the De Minimis Exemption (in accordance with Commission Regulation (EU) No 1407/2013, OJ L 352/1) and Innovation R&D aid in line with the General Block Exemption Regulation (in accordance with Commission Regulation (EU) No 651/2014 of 17 June 2014, OJ L 187/1)

AI Foundry
© 2025 Greater Manchester AI Foundry - Greater Security, Greater Intelligence, Greater Manchester