Explore the latest grant funding opportunities for your startup, scaleup or research organisation.
After a warm March, April has brought cooler weather, but the stream of grant competitions for UK innovators remains piping hot!
As always, you can find the biggest and best funding opportunities here, in the latest edition of Grants Watch. This edition features:
- Evergreen schemes from the UK government and the European Union
- Generous, sector-specific competitions for companies working on innovations in semiconductors, farming and rail.
Not sure what to apply for? We’ll tell you!
Even with convenient resources like this, it can be hard to know which grants your company and R&D qualify for, and harder still to understand which competitions you actually have a chance of winning.
If you want to know what you should be applying for, you can book a free, 30-minute Eligibility and Competitiveness Assessment. After exploring your R&D roadmap, my colleagues and I will tell you:
- What grants you’re eligible for
- Which grants you have the best chance of winning
- How much funding you could win
- What other types of government funding you may be eligible for
Get started on your grant funding journey now by booking your Eligibility and Competitiveness Assessment here.
In this edition
Contracts for Innovation: First of a Kind (FOAK) 2025
Funding available: Up to £200,000
Deadline: 28 May 2025
Delivered through the Department for Transport’s (DfT) FOAK programme, in collaboration with industry and Innovate UK, this competition funds the demonstration of late-stage of technologies that address one of four themes:
- AI for complex processes
- Bridge strikes
- Platform Train Interfaces
- Personal safety
This competition is open to organisations of any size. You can work alone or subcontract skills and expertise from other entities.
Learn more about the Contracts for Innovation: FOAK 2025 competition.
Developing Semiconductor Hardware For Critical Technologies
Funding available: Up to 300,000
Application Deadline: 29 May 2025
This Innovate UK competition is funding research designed to validate ideas for advanced semiconductor hardware. Projects must produce a technical and commercial feasibility study that identifies both opportunities for and barriers to achieving commercialisation.
This competition is open to companies of any size, but projects must be delivered by at least one SME.
Learn more about the Developing Semiconductor Hardware for Critical Technologies competition.
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EIC Accelerator
Funding available: Up to €2.5 million
Deadline: 1 October 2025 for stage 2 of the application
Run by Europe’s leading innovation funding agency, the European Innovation Council, the Accelerator scheme offers generous grants for UK startups and scale-ups looking to fund late-stage R&D to take mature innovations to market.
Accelerator has two strands:
- Open – Open to all fields of science and technology, but more competitive
- Challenges – For innovations focused on specific areas of technology
The areas are:
- Acceleration of advanced materials development and upscaling along the value chain
- Biotechnology-driven low-emission food and feed production systems
- GenAI4EU: Creating European Champions in Generative AI
- Innovative in-space servicing, operations, robotics and technologies for resilient EU space infrastructure
- Breakthrough innovations for future mobility
UK companies are eligible for all EIC competitions as the UK is associated to Horizon Europe, under which the EIC was established.
EIC Pathfinder
Funding available: Up to €4 million
Deadline: 21 May 2025 for the Open strand and 29 October 2025 for the Challenges strand
Pathfinder offers grants to UK startups and scaleups looking to perform R&D to validate early-stage, potentially ground-breaking innovations (TRL 1-2).
Like Accelerator, Pathfinder has two strands:
- Open – Grants of up to €3 million for consortia featuring at least 3 independent organisations from different EU member states and associated countries
- Challenges – up to €4 million for single applicants and small consortia whose R&D aligns with specific themes
The themes are:
- Biotech for climate resilient crops and plant-based biomanufacturing
- Generative-AI-based agents to revolutionise medical diagnosis and the treatment of cancer
- Towards autonomous robot collectives delivering collaborative tasks in dynamic, unstructured construction environments
- Waste-to-value devices: Circular production of renewable fuels, chemicals and materials
The deadlines are 21 May 2025 for the Open strand and 29 October 2025 for the Challenges strand.
EIC Transition
Funding available: Up to €2.5 million
Deadline: 17 September 2025
Unlike Pathfinder and Accelerator, Transition is only open to companies that have already received grant funding from one of the following competitions and organisations:
- EIC Pathfinder
- European Research Council proof of concept grants
- Horizon Europe research and innovation actions
- European Defence Fund (EDF)
Transition funds development work that is designed to take transformative innovations from “lab to market” and is open to both single organisations and small consortia.
Transition has just one strand, Open, which accepts applications from all areas of technology.
Farming Futures R&D Fund
Funding available: Up to £1.75 million
Deadline: 25 June 2025
This Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) competition, delivered in partnership with Innovate UK, is looking to fund collaborative projects that deliver innovative solutions in two areas:
Grants from these competitions cover between 50% and 70% of project costs, depending on your company’s size. You must apply as part of a consortium, led by a UK-registered business of any size and including at least one other UK-based organisation.
Both competitions offer funding for industrial research projects, which convert validated ideas into tangible innovations, such as prototypes, models, or working systems, that can be tested and refined in simulated or real-world environments.
Future Leaders Fellowships: Round 10
Funding available: Up to £3 million
Deadline: 5 November 2025, 11 am
This UKRI-funded programme offers large grants – covering up to four years of project work – to early-career innovators looking to tackle difficult and novel challenges.
The competition is designed to support excellence in innovation and develop the next generation of research and innovation leaders.
Highlights:
- Up to four years of project work funded
- Applicants can apply from any sector
- Open to people working at a range of non-academic organisations, including businesses, catapults and charities
If you’re applying from an eligible research organisation, you need to apply through the UKRI Funding Service.
Innovation Loans
Funding available: Up to £2 million
Deadline: 7 May for Round 20 and 2 July for Round 21
Innovate UK’s underutilised Innovation Loans Future Economy scheme offers £100,000 to £2 million in debt financing for startups and scaleups looking for funding to commercialise a late-stage technology.
Innovation Loans have a range of favourable features, such as below-market interest rates and repayment terms of up to 7 years. They also cover up to 100% of project costs, more than most Innovate UK competitions, which generally max out at 70%.
Innovation Loans are especially well-suited for companies that have already received grant funding, as they are designed to support innovations that have reached the stage of development typically achieved after a grant-funded project.
I4i Product Development Awards
Funding available: Uncapped
Deadline: 28 May 2025
Run by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR), the i4i Product Development Award offers grants to help SMEs and other organisations develop cutting-edge medical technologies that address unmet and emerging patient needs.
The amount of funding available through this call is uncapped, giving the NIHR flexibility to provide considerable funding to truly game-changing projects. Awards will cover up to 100% of project costs for SMEs, a rarity in the grant funding space.
Learn more about the i4i Product Development Award.
Let GrantTree find you funding
Looking for grant funding for your business or research organisation? GrantTree can help.
Over the last 15 years, we’ve secured more than £100 million for innovative projects. Calling on that unmatched experience, we can help you understand which competitions you are not only eligible for but have a good chance of winning, helping you make the most of the time you invest in your application.
If you’re not eligible for grants, we can also help you understand what other types of government funding you might be eligible for, such as the R&D Tax Credits scheme.
To find out what funding you should apply for, just get in touch. My colleagues and I will be right with you.
