Defence Innovation Loan/26 Cycle 5

Defence Innovation Loan FY25/26 Cycle 5 sits under UK Defence Innovation, the Ministry of Defence delivery body that absorbed DASA in February 2026. The route is repayable finance for UK defence and dual-use SMEs, and the wider Defence Innovation Loans service was paused while UKDI developed a new service. Even with that pause, the scheme's purpose is clear: fund companies that need debt rather than grant capital to push an innovation toward deployment. This cycle offered GBP 250k to GBP 1.75m, with a median actual award of GBP 750k and a cap that could cover up to 100 percent of project costs. It is annual in pattern, aimed at UK-incorporated SMEs, and the technical window runs from TRL 5 to 8. The route is not open to non-profits or individuals, and applicants cannot stack other defence loans against the same project. The best fit is a company with a defence or dual-use product that has moved beyond the first technical proof and needs financing to scale. Because the instrument is debt, the application has to make commercial and repayment sense, not just technical sense. Teams that can show a credible route to market, a focused project scope, and a clear defence customer problem are the ones that will read as investable under this model.

Each grant below is a distinct funding opportunity with its own eligibility, scope, and deliverables.