Australian Research Council

Funds competitive Australian university research across disciplines and also advises national policy through research quality and integrity frameworks.

Australian Research Council (ARC) is Australia's federal research funding agency for non-medical university-based research. It sits in the Education portfolio, reports to the Minister for Education, and was established in 2001 under the Australian Research Council Act 2001. Its remit is wider than grantmaking: it also advises government on research policy, research security and integrity, ethics, research excellence, and partnerships.

ARC delivers the National Competitive Grants Program, which supports pure basic, strategic basic, and applied research across all disciplines except medical research. The main streams are Discovery and Linkage. Discovery includes projects, DECRA, Future Fellowships, and the industry fellowship schemes; Linkage funds projects that connect universities with industry, government, community organisations, and international partners. Typical caps in the current portfolio run from AUD 150,000 for DECRA and the early-career industry fellowships to AUD 1.5 million for Industry Laureate Fellowships.

Applications run through an administering organisation, usually a university research office, rather than directly from a company or individual researcher. That structure suits teams that can anchor a proposal inside an eligible research organisation and evidence both excellence and impact. The ARC is strongest when a project needs national peer review, university leadership, and a clear case for how research will move into industry or public value.