The Advanced Propulsion Centre (APC) has reopened the DRIVE35 Scale-up Fund, with up to £150 million available for UK businesses building the factories that will make zero emission vehicles.
This is the fifth drawdown of the fund, and it's aimed squarely at the gap between a technology that works in the lab and a production line that can supply an automotive customer. If you've validated your product and you now need to build the pilot or demonstration facility to make it at volume, this is the competition for you.
Below, I have explained the key things you need to know about this competition before you apply: who is eligible, how much funding is on the table, and what the application process looks like.
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Who is Eligible?
Your Organisation
To lead a project, you must be a UK registered business of any size. You can apply on your own or lead a collaboration.
If you're working with partners, you can bring in the following as collaborators:
- Academic institutions
- Charities
- Not-for-profit organisations
- Public sector organisations
- Research and technology organisations (RTOs)
- UK registered businesses of any size
Academic institutions and RTOs can join a project but can't lead one or work alone. You can use subcontractors, and they can be based overseas if you can justify why the work can't be done in the UK.
Your Project
Your project must:
- Have total eligible costs of at least £5 million
- Have a grant request between £2.5 million and £20 million
- Last at least 12 months, including the time you spend raising co-investment
- Start on or after 1 June 2027
- End by 31 March 2030
All funded work must be carried out in the UK, and you must intend to exploit the project results from or within the UK.
Your project must also:
- Be aligned with the UK Industrial Strategy
- Develop manufacturing facilities or processes at pilot or demonstration scale
- Focus on zero emission vehicle technology, like electrical energy storage, electric machines and driveline, power electronics including Vehicle to Everything (V2X), lightweighting materials and processes, fuel cell systems, hydrogen storage and management, or zero emission vehicle assembly
- Show a clear route to market with identified customers and a ten-year revenue forecast
- Unlock private co-investment of at least £2 for every £1 of grant you request
Don't rule yourself out if you're not building the vehicle technology itself. The scope also covers the upstream supply chain, so raw materials, components and subassemblies count, as do circularity and design for disassembly, and deploying digital transformation, process decarbonisation and lean manufacturing across your production.
That list isn't exhaustive, so read the scope section on the competition page before you commit. The APC won't fund projects that:
- Are primarily about developing digital or data technology
- Are speculative site enabling works
- Depend on export performance or on using domestic inputs
- Develop or produce low carbon fuels
- Focus on fuel retail or wholesale, hydrogen production, off-vehicle charging, or energy retail and supply
- Focus on small personal mobility, like e-scooters, e-bikes and other low-powered devices
- Use fossil-fuelled internal combustion technology, unless you're transitioning an off-road engine to non-fossil fuels
How Much Funding Can I Apply For?
The amount you can claim depends on your organisation's type and size and the sort of research your project involves.
Individual grants range from £2.5 million to £20 million.
Applying as a Company
| Project Type | Micro and Small | Medium | Large |
|---|---|---|---|
| Industrial Research* | 50% | 50% | 30% |
*Industrial research refers to planned research aimed at acquiring new knowledge for developing new products, processes, or services.
Funding Example
If you're a small company with total eligible project costs of £10 million, you could claim a grant of £5 million. You will need to fund the remaining £5 million from other sources, like R&D Tax Relief, investment or loans.
On top of that, you'll need to show you can unlock private co-investment worth at least twice your grant request, so a £5 million grant means demonstrating £10 million of private investment into the wider business.
Applying as a Non-Commercial Organisation
Research participation is capped tightly on this competition. Research organisations can share up to 10% of the total eligible project costs between them, and are funded at higher rates:
- Up to 100% of eligible costs if you are a charity, not-for-profit, public sector organisation, research organisation, or RTO
- Up to 80% of full economic costs (FEC) if you're a Je-S-registered institution, like a university
Every participant that receives a grant also pays an industrial contribution of 3.5% towards the APC's operating budget.
How Do I Apply?
The deadline for applications is 4 November 2026.
Applications are submitted via Innovate UK's Innovation Funding Service (IFS) portal.
The application is split into 3 sections:
Project Details
This section covers the basics of your project and your organisation, including:
- Application team
- Application questions guidance
- Project details
- Project summary
- Public description
- Scope
Most answers in this section are limited to 400 words.
Application Questions
There are 29 questions in total:
- Nine unscored questions covering topics like your organisation, your project team and equality, diversity and inclusion
- Twenty scored questions covering your manufacturing capability, commercial viability, supply chain benefit, strategic alignment, market opportunity, technical and manufacturing readiness, commercialisation plan, co-investment, team, project management, risks, value for money and the case for public funding
You can include appendices as PDFs for the scored questions, and one question needs you to complete and upload a value for money workbook in Excel.
Finances
Here you'll set out your project costs, how you'll fund your share, and the financial position of every organisation in the project.
Your application will be reviewed by 5 independent assessors. Their individual scores will be combined to determine your final result.
Applications that score well are then appraised by economists at the Department for Business, Innovation, Science and Trade, who apply a value for money threshold set by HM Treasury. This is an extra hurdle you won't find on a standard Innovate UK competition, so your economic case needs to be as strong as your technical one.
If you're successful, you'll be notified by 17 February 2027. Applications that pass the initial assessment may be invited to an interview between 19 and 22 January 2027, held at the APC's offices in Coventry.
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