Case Study
Innovate UK
OVERVIEW
Period: 2023–2024 (retainer); 2025-present (ad-hoc)
Region: South Africa
Sector: Space, Energy, Circular Economy
Plane Talking provided marketing and communications support to Innovate UK’s Global Alliance Africa project in South Africa. Acting as the team’s in-country communications arm, our goal was to raise awareness, drive engagement and promote the outcomes of their activities.
Services Provided
Strategy — Developed an annual, overarching communications strategy to maintain visibility and guide project-level communications.
Market Advisory — Monitored market developments, opportunities and nuances, providing regular reports to support decision-making.
Copywriting — Drafted and edited press releases, opinion editorials, blog articles, social media posts, video scripts, website content, invitations, reports and other written materials.
Graphic Design — Produced layouts and managed the production of banners, charts, media walls and reports.
Media Relations — Built and maintained media lists, issued press releases, pitched for article placements and managed interview requests. Provided media training on occasion.
Stakeholder Engagement — Built and helped manage relationships with stakeholders across the public, private and civil sectors.
Event Management — Conceptualised, organised and executed stakeholder meetings, roundtables, seminars, webinars, networking events, tours and formal functions.
“Our experience of working with Plane Talking is that they provide a professional, efficient, friendly and extremely competent communications and marketing service that has helped our project showcase our work and build our reputation as a newly emerging innovation ecosystem player in South Africa. Our project works on some extremely niche topics relevant to the science, technology and innovation ambitions of the UK government, with a strong focus on promoting UK-South Africa linkages and bilateral partnership activities. Plane Talking haa gone above and beyond to provide a wildly varying range of quality content that spans from geospatial technologies to women entrepreneurs in townships, to water technologies to address water treatment residue to name but a few. They have unfalteringly adapted their approach to the different contexts, help us launch grant funded competitions, promoted our work on local media channels, supported with the launch of events and everything in between. We highly recommend Plane Talking as an extremely competent agency that has no problem developing comms and marketing strategy and outputs for a large and multifaceted organisation such as Innovate UK.”
— Marisa Naidoo, Country Lead for South Africa, Innovate UK
Notable Projects
UK-Africa Space Technology for Sustainability Global Innovation Network (2023–2024) — Supported the establishment of the Network by arranging a space-tech networking dinner in Stellenbosch to introduce Innovate UK to the Western Cape Space Cluster. Delivered marketing and communications support for a delegation of stakeholders from South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya and Rwanda to visit UK-based space organisations, companies and institutions. Developed an “always-on” communications plan to create community-building content and maintain engagement with African space stakeholders via a LinkedIn group.
NextGen Space Challenge (2024) — Supported the launch and promotion of the inaugural Challenge, designed to inspire university undergraduates to pursue postgraduate studies and careers in the space sector amid skills shortages and industry competition. Managed the marketing and application drive, developed news and social media content, and arranged in-person university lecture briefings.
UK-SA Energy Access Tour (2025) — Conceptualised, planned and delivered a seven-day tour of Cape Town’s energy industry for 16 UK-based clean energy startups, coinciding with the Africa Energy Forum. Responsibilities included developing the programme (briefings with government and industry leaders, site visits, networking events and cultural activities), managing logistics, and overseeing project finances.
Get in touch with our team
Whether you need communications support, have questions or want to explore collaboration opportunities — our team is ready to assist.