ARIA Scaling Trust R&D Programme
Funds rigorous research in AI safety and provable AI security at early technical stages.
ARIA Scaling Trust R&D Programme 2026 sits under the Advanced Research and Invention Agency, the UK's crown body for high-risk research. Its focus is narrow and technical: AI safety and provable AI security, not general-purpose AI commercialization. The programme uses grants from £100,000 to £3 million, with a median award around £800,000, and it runs on an annual cadence. It is open to for-profit applicants, with some nonprofit participation allowed, and it reaches UK applicants with some international access. The work is set at TRL 2-5. The notes point to two tracks inside the programme: tooling at £200,000-£2 million and research at £100,000-£3 million. The best fit is a team with a precise technical question, a clear milestone plan, and the discipline to fund one serious objective rather than try to stack multiple asks onto the same milestone. Applicants that can show rigorous methods and a narrow security claim are better placed than broad AI teams with vague deliverables.
No upcoming rounds verified. Cadence: Annual.