I use a class that has all the functionality of the control.

So the part that does the validation is as below: 

Private Sub btnSaveAddress_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles btnSaveAddress.Click

    'Close the template and save any pending changes.
    Dim gRow As Infragistics.Win.UltraWinGrid.UltraGridRow = mGrid.ActiveRow
    If gRow Is Nothing Then Return
    Dim strError As String = ""
    If validateAddressRow(gRow, strError) = False Then
      ShowMessage(strError, "MB_ICONSTOP", False)

       ' I tried the following code, but fails

       mUGridRowEditTemplate.Controls.Item("Address").Focus()

      Return
    End If

    'now update row

    ..... 

  End Sub

 Yes, it works, the "Addres" is the ColumnKey and I was getting an exception, as you mention, however when I changed to the name of the actual proxy it works perfectly.

Thanks a lot for your quick responses. 

 I used the exact same code and it worked for me.  That code is not specific to the proxy, since you are just calling Focus on a generic control.  You'll have to make sure that "Address" is the *name* of the actual proxy and not just the name of the column, though I'd think you'd get an exception if you didn't have a control named "Address".

-Matt

Is this the right code:

mUGridRowEditTemplate.Controls.Item("Address").Focus()

where  as:

mUGridRowEditTemplate is the member for the UltraGridRowEditTemplate and "Address" is the ColumnKey 

Thanks for the quick responses

I'm not sure what your ShowMessage method does, but if I just showed a MessageBox and then set focus to a proxy, it worked correctly for me.  My guess is that either your ShowMessage is causing the focus to shift, or more likely something in your row updating logic is causing the ActiveCell of the grid to change, which would also cause the currently focused proxy to change.

-Matt