Innovate UK opens a £2m Eureka call for UK-Japan R&D partnerships

Innovate UK opens a £2m Eureka call for UK-Japan R&D partnerships

9 October 2026: Innovate UK has opened Eureka collaborative R&D: Globalstars Japan 2027, a grant competition with £2,000,000 in total for UK organisations that team up with a Japanese small or medium-sized enterprise. Applications close at 11:00 UK time on 20 January 2027.

Not yet independently verified. The UKRI page does not give project size, duration, funding rate or cost rules; those sit on the Innovation Funding Service, which we could not read. Innosuisse's page gives no deadline or funding amount. We will update this when it can be confirmed, and remove this note.

Opening, closing and where to apply

The competition opened at 09:00 UK time on 7 October 2026, and UKRI published its opportunity page on 9 October. Applications go through the Innovation Funding Service, where the competition is numbered 2586. The call funds collaborative industrial research and development with partners from Japan and selected Eureka countries.

Who has to be in the consortium

Entries are for collaborations only; a single organisation cannot apply alone. A consortium must include at least one UK registered business and a Japan registered SME as a minimum. It may also add other UK registered organisations and organisations from other participating Eureka countries.

What the UKRI page leaves to the funding service

UKRI's page does not give project size, project length, funding rates, cost rules, assessment criteria, contacts or briefing events. It points applicants to the Innovation Funding Service listing for all of that, so the full competition text is where a firm has to look before applying.

The Swiss side of the same call

Switzerland has opened its side of the call. Innosuisse, the Swiss innovation agency, posted on 7 October that Swiss companies and research institutes are invited to run R&D projects with Japanese start-ups and SMEs. Large companies, universities and research institutions can take part in projects led by Japanese start-ups as subcontractors or joint research partners.

Innosuisse names Japan's New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO) as the Japanese funding body. Its deadline and funding terms are in a guidelines PDF dated 5 October, not on the page itself.

Topics in and out, and the other Eureka countries

The Swiss page describes the call as open to all R&D areas and gives examples: quantum technology, artificial intelligence, robotics, semiconductors, electronics, energy and environment, biotechnology, new materials, medical devices, aerospace and mining. It excludes technologies associated with nuclear power, pharmaceutical development and regenerative medicine product development.

Alongside Switzerland, it lists Belgium, Canada, the United Kingdom, Austria, Estonia, France, Germany, Israel, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Singapore, South Korea, Spain and Turkey as participating countries. A UK business that wants a Japanese partner can use the b2match partner-search platform that Innosuisse links to.

Our startup funding programme category lists 71 schemes and programmes for founders elsewhere.

Innosuisse's page lists a schedule section but gives no dates in its text.

Sources

• UKRI: Eureka collaborative R&D Globalstars Japan 2027, 9 October 2026
• Innosuisse: Eureka Globalstars call with Japan, 7 October 2026