Battery innovation concept development round 2

Key Features

UK registered businesses can apply for a share of up to £25 million to support innovation in battery grade material technologies for electrification. This funding is from The Battery Innovation Programme.

Programme:     Innovate UK

Award:     Share of up to £25 million

Opens: 9th Apr 2026

Closes: 27th May 2026

TBAT

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Grant Overview

Innovate UK is investing up to £25 million to fund innovation projects through the Battery Innovation Programme on behalf of the Department for Business and Trade.

Grant Scope

The aim of this competition is to collaborative R&D in strategically critical areas of the UK batter value chain addressing key capability gaps that limit the UK’s ability to:

  • scale battery manufacturing materials
  • secure access to critical battery materials
  • capture greater economic value domestically
  • scale and strengthen circular economy capability, enabling industrial deployment of battery recycling and reprocessing

Projects must clearly state which group they align with out of the following:

  • Material Extraction – Innovations that strengthen sustainable, competitive access to raw materials.
  • Material Processing – Advancing processed materials required for high performance, cost effective cells.
  • Recycling and Circular Economy – Strengthening UK capability in end-of-life processing, reuse, recovery and circularity.

Eligibility Criteria

When applying for funding, your project must have a grant funding request of between £500,000 and £4 million. Projects must not start before 1st October 2026 and end by 28th September 2029, with projects lasting between 12 and 36 months.

Lead: To lead a collaborative project, organisations must a UK registered business of any size with the consortium containing at least one UK registered micro, small or medium sized enterprise claiming grant funding on the application.

Project team:

To collaborate with a lead, organisations must be a UK registered business of any size, academic institute, charity, not-for profit, public sector or research and technology organisation. Each parter must be invited into the Innovation Funding Service by the lead on the project.

Non-funded partners:

Projects can include organisations that do not claim any funding for their work on the project. These costs will be covered from their own resources and can include UK, EU and other non-UK organisations. Non-UK partners are allowed to carry out project work from within their home countries and exploit the results outside of the UK.

Subcontractors:

Subcontractors are allowed in this competition and can be from anywhere in the UK. Overseas subcontractors can be used, but you must state why UK subcontractors were not used in your application.

Number of applications:

UK registered businesses can lead on one application and be included as a collaborator in any number of applications. Academic institutions, research and technology organisations, charity, not for profit or public sector organisations can collaborate on any number of applications.

Previous applications:

Previous applications can be used in this competition.

Grant Exclusions

The following projects cannot be funded:

  • Projects that do not align with the Industrial Strategy
  • Projects for personal mobility and consumer electronics
  • Projects that are at early stage discovery research
  • Projects focused primarily on battery second life use or electrode manufacturing
  • Projects focused on cell production, including optimised large scale manufacturing processes, understanding of slurry behaviours and improvements in cell design and performance
  • Projects focused on modules and pack innovation

Grant Funding

Innovate UK has been allocated up to £25 million to fund innovation projects that support development and scale up of UK battery manufacturing capabilities.

For industrial research projects, you can get funding for your eligible project costs of:

  • up to 70% if you are a micro or small organisation
  • up to 60% if you are a medium sized organisation
  • up to 50% if you are a large organisation

Research participation

Research organisations undertaking non-economic activity as part of the project can share up to 30% of the total eligible project costs. Consortiums that contain more than one research organisation undertaking non-economic activity, this maximum is shared between them. Of that 30% you can get funding for your eligible project costs of up to:

  • 100% of your eligible project costs if you are an RTO, charity, not for profit organisation, public sector organisation or research organisation
  • 80% of full economic costs (FEC) if you are a Je-S registered institution such as an academic

Eligibility criteria for claiming 80% of FEC funding

  1. Research organisations using the Je-S system must submit their costs through the Je-S system which calculates the 80% FEC figure.
  2. On IFS, only the 80% FEC output should be entered at 100% funding.
  3. Applicants do not need to show the remaining 20% on the finance table.

For further information on this competition, please see full details.

Full competition details

Interested in applying for this competition?

Book an appointment to speak to one of our advisors to discuss your eligibility to apply for this Grant Funding opportunity.