UK organisations can apply for funding to collaborate on industrial research projects with partners in Eureka member countries and Japan.
- Competition opens: Monday 13 October 2025
- Competition closes: Wednesday 21 January 2026 11:00am
UK organisations can apply for funding to collaborate on industrial research projects with partners in Eureka member countries and Japan.
This competition is for UK businesses that want to apply to the Eureka Globalstars Japan 2026 call. Please visit the Eureka call for proposals web page if you are not a UK applicant.
Innovate UK, part of UK Research and Innovation, will invest a minimum of £2 million. This is to fund collaborative research and development (CR&D) projects focused on industrial research. This is subject to a sufficient number of high quality applications being received.
We reserve the right to adjust funding allocations for any of our competitions under exceptional circumstances, for example, in response to changes in policy, portfolio funding considerations, or broader government funding decisions.
The aim of this competition is to fund business led, collaborative research and development (CR&D) projects focused on industrial research. This competition will be for innovative proposals developed between the UK, Japan and the other Eureka participating countries. Innovate UK will be funding the UK partners only.
We encourage projects in key sector areas which align to the UK Industrial Strategy.
Your project must have high market potential and develop at least one of the following:
Projects must include at least one partner from Japan and can include other partners from one of the Eureka members participating in the competition. The members are:
In applying to this competition, you are entering into a competitive process. This competition has a funding limit, so we may not be able to fund all the proposed projects. It may be the case that your project scores highly but we are still unable to fund it.
Our experience from similar competitions suggests that you could have 20% chance of success.
The lead applicant must submit your Innovate UK application by 11am UK time on the deadline stated in this Innovate UK competition brief. We cannot guarantee other government or third party sites will always show the correct competition information.
Your project team must submit the Eureka project application form to the Eureka website by 11:59am central European time (10:59am UK time) on21 January 2026.
Grant
UK applicants can apply for total grant of up to £600,000 for each project.
We welcome and encourage applications from people of all backgrounds and are committed to making our application process accessible to everyone. This includes making reasonable adjustments, for people who have a disability or a long-term condition and face barriers applying to us.
You can contact us at any time to ask for guidance.
We recommend you contact us at least 15 working days before this competition’s closing date to allow us to put the most suitable support in place. The support we can provide may be limited if you contact us close to the competition deadline.
Note that Innovate UK will be closed from 24 December until 2 January.
You can contact Innovate UK by email or call 0300 321 4357. Our phone lines are open from 9am to 12pm and 2pm to 5pm UK time, Monday to Friday (excluding bank holidays).
Who can apply
Your project
UK applicants can apply for total grant of up to £600,000 for each project.
Your project can last up to three years and is expected to start by 1 July 2026. The start date depends on the national funding procedures of the Eureka members involved in the selected projects.
Projects must be collaborative.
You must only include eligible project costs in your application. See our overview of eligible project costs. For specific guidance, see the eligibility section in this competition.
If your project’s grant funding request or duration falls outside of our eligibility criteria, you must provide justification by email to support@iuk.ukri.org at least 10 working days before the competition closes. We will decide whether to approve your request.
If you have not requested approval or your application has not been approved by us, you will be made ineligible. Your application will then not be sent for assessment.
Eureka terminology and roles
The terminology differs between Eureka and Innovate UK. In the Innovate UK application the ‘project lead’ is responsible for the entire project but Eureka uses the term ‘main participant’. For partners in the collaboration Eureka uses ‘other participants’.
Even if the project lead is from a participating Eureka member other than the UK, the UK registered partners can still claim funding from Innovate UK. These collaborations must include at least one UK registered business of any size.
UK lead applicant
The UK registered partners in your Eureka project must nominate one business, of any size, to start an Innovate UK application. We refer to them as the ‘lead organisation’ and the person they nominate to have overall responsibility as the ‘lead applicant’.
The lead applicant has an overall view of the application and must:
The UK lead applicant must collaborate with at least one SME from Japan participating in the competition. It must be a separate legal entity, not linked to the UK partners.
You can also collaborate with other participating Eureka members in addition to Japan.
Overall Eureka project team
The organisations from participating Eureka members must meet the funding and eligibility conditions of their respective national funding bodies. These will be published on the Eureka call for proposals web page when this competition opens. These organisations must apply through their own funding bodies and not through the Innovation Funding Service.
Each partner must carry out the majority of their funded work within the Eureka member from which they receive funding, for example the UK for Innovate UK funding.
There must be a genuine collaboration. No more than 70% of the total eligible project costs can be claimed by a single partner or by all partners from a single participating Eureka member collectively.
UK project team
The UK lead applicant can also collaborate with:
UK research organisations cannot lead or work alone. They must be able to show how they will exploit the results of the project to grow the wider sector in the UK.
To be an eligible collaboration, the lead and at least one other organisation must:
Subcontractors
Subcontractors are allowed in this competition but they must not account for more than 20% of the UK partners’ total eligible costs. Subcontractors can be from anywhere in the UK. Where subcontractors are non-UK based, please justify why you are unable to use a UK alternative.
We would expect subcontractor costs to be justified and appropriate to the total eligible project costs.
Partners not claiming funding
A non-grant claiming UK partner cannot lead on a project.
Your collaboration can include organisations from Eureka members that are not participating in this funding competition provided:
Number of applications
A UK registered business can only lead on one application but can be included as a collaborator in a further two applications.
If a UK registered business is not leading any application, it can collaborate in up to three applications.
An academic institution or RTO can collaborate on any number of applications.
Sanctions
This competition will not fund you, or provide any financial benefit to any individual or entities directly or indirectly involved with you, which would expose Innovate UK or any direct or indirect beneficiary of funding from Innovate UK to UK Sanctions. For example, through any procurement, commercial, business development or supply chain activity with any entity as lead, partner or subcontractor related to these countries, administrations and terrorist groups.
Use of animals in research and innovation
Innovate UK expects and supports the provision and safeguarding of welfare standards for animals used in research and innovation, according to best practice and up to date guidance.
Applicants must ensure that all of the proposed work within projects, both that in the UK and internationally, will comply with the UKRI guidance on the use of animals in research and innovation.
Any projects selected for funding which involve animals will be asked to provide additional information on welfare and ethical considerations, as well as compliance with any relevant legislation as part of the project start-up process. This information will be reviewed before an award is made.
You can use a previously submitted application to apply for this competition.
If you have previously submitted an application that reached our assessment stage, you can re-apply once more with the same proposal.
If there are minor differences to the proposal, but it is judged by us to be ‘not materially different’, the same rule applies.
We will not award you funding if you have:
Innovate UK may withhold a grant payment at any time if you have any outstanding sums due to us in relation to other projects.
This competition provides funding in line with the Subsidy Control Act 2022. Further information about the Subsidy requirements can be found within the Subsidy Control Act 2022 (legislation.gov.uk).
Innovate UK is unable to award organisations that are considered to be in financial difficulty. We will conduct financial viability and eligibility tests to confirm this is not the case following the application stage.
EU State aid rules now only apply in limited circumstances. Please see the Windsor Framework to check if these rules apply to your organisation.
In the ‘Project details’ section of your application you will be asked questions to indicate if State Aid or Subsidy applies to your organisation.
Further Information
If you are unsure about your obligations under the Subsidy Control Act 2022 or the State aid rules, you should take independent legal advice. We are unable to advise on individual eligibility or legal obligations.
You must always make sure that the funding awarded to you is compliant with all current Subsidy Control legislation applicable in the United Kingdom.
This aims to regulate any advantage granted by a public sector body which threatens to, or distorts competition in the United Kingdom or any other country or countries.
This award is classified as a Subsidy which does not form part of your Minimal Financial Assistance or De Minimis allowance.
A minimum of £2 million has been allocated to fund UK organisations undertaking innovation projects in this competition. This is subject to us receiving a sufficient number of high quality applications. Funding will be in the form of a grant.
We reserve the right to adjust funding allocations for any of our competitions under exceptional circumstances, for example, in response to changes in policy, portfolio funding considerations, or broader government funding decisions.
For eligible UK organisations undertaking industrial research projects, you could get funding for your eligible project costs of:
The UK registered research organisations in your consortium can share up to 30% of the UK total eligible project costs:
Eligibility criteria for claiming 80% of FEC funding
To find out more see our: Cost Guidance for Academics.
If your consortium contains more than one UK research organisation, this maximum will be shared between them.
Innovate UK may revoke our decision to provide funding without notice if government commitment for this initiative is withdrawn.
The aim of this competition is to fund business led, collaborative research and development (CR&D) projects focused on industrial research. This competition will be for innovative proposals developed between the UK, Japan and the other Eureka participating countries. Innovate UK will be funding the UK partners only.
Your project must have high market potential and develop at least one of the following:
Your collaborative R&D proposal must demonstrate:
Your project must have high market potential and develop at least one of the following:
We encourage projects in key sector areas which align to the UK Industrial Strategy.
We will not fund projects that:
We cannot fund projects that are:
13 October 2025 Competition opens
17 October 2025 Online briefing event: watch the recording
Briefing slides are now available to download from supporting information.
21 January 2026 Eureka deadline 10:59am UK time
21 January 2026 11:00am Competition closes
27 April 2026 Applicants notified
28 April 2026 Successful applicant briefing
1 July 2026 Project start from
You must read the guidance on applying for a competition on the Innovation Funding Service before you start.
Your Innovate UK application will be ineligible if you do not upload the completed Eureka project application in question 3.
UK led consortium
If you are a UK lead applicant, you must:
You can reopen your application once submitted, up until the competition deadline. You must resubmit the application before the competition deadline.
Non-UK led consortium
If your consortium is led by an organisation from a non UK participating Eureka member, one of the UK grant claiming partners must be the Innovate UK lead applicant. They will submit the Innovate UK application. Only include UK organisations in the application.
More information about the application process for non UK participating Eureka members is provided at the Eureka call for proposals once the competition opens.
What we will ask you
The application is split into four sections:
Accessibility and Inclusion
We welcome and encourage applications from people of all backgrounds and are committed to making our application process accessible to everyone. This includes making reasonable adjustments, for people who have a disability or a long-term condition and face barriers applying to us.
You can contact us at any time to ask for guidance.
We recommend you contact us at least 15 working days before this competition’s closing date to allow us to put the most suitable support in place. The support we can provide may be limited if you contact us close to the competition deadline.
Note that Innovate UK will be closed from 24 December until 2 January.
You can contact Innovate UK by email or call 0300 321 4357. Our phone lines are open from 9am to 12pm and 2pm to 5pm UK time, Monday to Friday (excluding bank holidays).
This section provides background for the assessors and is not scored.
Application details
The lead applicant must complete this section. Give your project’s title, start date and duration.
Application team
Decide which organisations will work with you on the project. Invite people from those organisations to help complete the application.
Project summary
Describe your project briefly and be clear about what makes it innovative. We use this section to assign experts to assess your application.
Your answer can be up to 400 words long.
Public description
Describe your project in detail, and in a way that you are happy to see published. Do not include any commercially sensitive information. If we award your project funding, we will publish this description. This could happen before you start your project.
Your answer can be up to 400 words long.
Scope
Describe how your project fits the scope of the competition. If your project is not in scope, it will not be sent for assessment. We will tell you the reason why.
Your answer can be up to 400 words long.
The assessors will score your answers to these questions except for questions 1 to 6. You will receive feedback from them for each question.
Your answer to each question can be up to 400 words long. Do not include any website addresses (URLs) in your answers unless we have explicitly requested a link to a video. If you do, your application will be made ineligible.
Question 1. Applicant location (not scored)
You must state the name and full registered address of your organisation, any partners or any subcontractors working on the project. We are collecting this information to understand more about the geographical location of all applicants.
Question 2. Animal testing (not scored)
Will your project involve any trials with animals or animal testing?
You must select one option:
We will only support innovation projects conducted to the highest standards of animal welfare.
Further information for proposals involving animal testing is available at the UKRI Good Research Hub and NC3R’s animal welfare guidance.
Question 3: Eureka application (not scored)
You must upload a copy of your completed Eureka application as an appendix. It must be in a PDF format. The font must be legible at 100% zoom.
Type ‘Eureka application attached’ as your answer.
Question 4. Permits and licences (not scored)
Will you have the correct permits and licences in place to carry out your project?
We are unable to fund projects which do not have the correct permits or licences in place by your project start date.
You must select one option:
Question 5. International Collaboration (not scored)
You must provide details of your effective international collaboration or engagement. Projects must include at least one SME from Japan and can include other partners from one of the Eureka members participating in the competition.
You must include a list of the names of any international partners, project co-leads, visiting researchers, or other collaborators and the country they are based in.
You must also include details of any subcontractors or service providers.
Question 6. Trusted Research and Innovation (not scored)
You must explain if your proposed project work relates to UKRI’s Trusted Research and Innovation (TR&I) Principles, including:
If your proposed work does not relate to UKRI’s TR&I Principles, your answer must confirm this.
We may ask you to provide additional TR&I information at a later date, in line with UKRI TR&I Principles and funding terms and conditions.
Question 7. Need or challenge
What is the business need, technological challenge or market opportunity behind your innovation?
Explain:
Question 8. Approach and innovation
What approach will you take and where will the focus of the innovation be?
Explain:
You can submit one appendix to support your answer. It can include diagrams and charts. It must be a PDF no larger than 10MB. It can be up to two A4 pages and must be legible at 100% zoom.
Question 9. Team and resources
Who is in the project team and what are their roles?
Explain:
You can submit one appendix. This can include a short summary of the main people working on the project to support your answer. It must be a PDF no larger than 10MB. It can be up to two A4 pages and must be legible at 100% zoom.
Question 10. Market awareness
What does the market you are targeting look like?
Describe:
If your project is highly innovative, where the market may be unexplored, describe or explain:
Question 11. Outcomes and route to market
How are you going to grow your business and increase your productivity into the long term as a result of the project?
Explain:
If there is any research organisation activity in the project, describe:
Question 12. Wider impacts
What impact might this project have outside the project team?
Describe, and where possible, measure the economic benefits from the project such as productivity increases and import substitution, to:
Describe, and where possible, measure:
Describe any expected social impacts, either positive or negative on, for example:
Question 13. Project management
How will you manage your project effectively?
Explain:
You must submit a project plan or Gantt chart as an appendix to support your answer. It must be a PDF no larger than 10MB. It can be up to two A4 pages and must be legible at 100% zoom.
Question 14. Risks
What are the main risks for this project?
Explain:
You must submit a risk register as an appendix to support your answer. It must be a PDF no larger than 10MB. It can be up to two A4 pages and must be legible at 100% zoom.
Question 15. Added value
How will this public funding help you to accelerate or enhance your approach to developing your project towards commercialisation? What impact would this award have on the organisations involved?
Explain:
Question 16. Costs and value for money
How much will the project cost and how does it represent value for money for the team and the taxpayer?
In terms of your project goals, explain:
Each UK organisation in your project must complete their own project costs, organisation details and funding details in the application. Academic institutions must complete and upload a Je-S form.
For an overview on what costs you can claim, see our project costs guidance. Note this is general guidance, for specific guidance please see the eligibility section in this competition. You can also view our application finances video.
This section is not scored but will provide background to your project.
Each UK partner must complete the Project Impact questions before being able to submit the application.
More information can be found in our Project Impact guidance and by viewing our Impact Management Framework video.
Innovate UK complies with the requirements of UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018, and is committed to upholding data protection legislation, and protecting your information in accordance with data protection principles.
Your application will be reviewed by three independent assessors based on the content of your application and their skills or expertise relevant to your project. All of the scores awarded will count towards the total score used to make the funding decision unless you are notified otherwise.
You can find out more about our assessment process in the General Guidance.
Your submitted application will be assessed against these criteria:
Eureka Globalstars Japan 2026 assessor guidance.pdf (opens in a new window)
Further information can be found on the Eureka website.
Online briefing event: watch the recording
Briefing slides are available to download:
APPLICANT BRIEFING Eureka GlobalStars Japan 2026.pdf (opens in a new window)
If you want help to find a project collaborator, contact the Innovate UK Business Connect or the Enterprise Europe Network.
If you need help with the Eureka project application form, contact Eureka directly.
If you need more information on submitting to Innovate UK, email us at support@iuk.ukri.org or call the competition helpline on 0300 321 4357,
Our phone lines are open from 9am to 12pm and 2pm to 5pm UK time, Monday to Friday (excluding bank holidays).
Innovate UK or any of our partners will not tolerate abusive language in any written or verbal correspondence, applications, social media or any other form that might affect staff.
About Eureka
Eureka is an intergovernmental network launched in 1985. Its aim is to support market-oriented R&D and innovation projects by industry, research centres and universities across all technological sectors. It has 45 member states, including the European Union, represented by the European Commission.
With its flexible and decentralised network, Eureka offers project partners:
A Secure Innovation campaign has been developed to help founders and leaders of innovative startups protect their technology, competitive advantage, and reputation.
This was developed by UK’s National Protective Security Authority (NPSA) and the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC).
This competition is jointly operated by Innovate UK, and the following organisations (each an ‘agency’):
Your submitted application and any other information you provide at the application stage can be submitted to each agency on an individual basis for its storage, processing and use. Any relevant information produced during the application process concerning your application can be shared by one agency with the other, for its individual storage, processing and use.
This means that any information given to or generated by Innovate UK in respect of your application may be passed on to each agency and vice versa.
Innovate UK is directly accountable to you for its holding and processing of your information, including any personal data and confidential information. It is held in accordance with its Information Management Policy.
Innovate UK may also share any relevant information submitted and produced during the application process concerning your application with Innovate UK’s national and regional UK third parties and partners who may contact you. For more information see how we handle grant applicant and grant holder data.
Innovate UK and each agency are directly accountable to you for their holding and processing of your information, including any personal data and confidential information. Data is held in accordance with their own policies. Accordingly, Innovate UK, Innovate UK Business Connect and each agency will be data controllers for personal data submitted during the application.
Innovate UK Business Connect Privacy Policy
Eureka | Legal (eurekanetwork.org)
New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO), Japan Privacy Policy
Enterprise Singapore Privacy Statement
KIAT, South Korea Privacy Policy
Innovate UK complies with the requirements of UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018, and is committed to upholding data protection legislation, and protecting your information in accordance with data protection principles.
The Information Commissioner’s Office also has a useful guide for organisations, which outlines the data protection principles.