A crypto hackathon ₿, ARROW programme extension for SMEs 🏹, Win £300k TV Ad Airtime 📺

Scaling our efforts beyond the region & a reminder on the benefits of our AI system

Author

Ben Mushen
May 03, 2025 • Estimated Reading Time: 24 minutes

Hey there,

This month, we added 338 new opportunities to the directory, and this number is forecast to grow as we set our sights on even broader coverage 👀 stay tuned!

We’ve listed a snapshot of some below with short summaries for your convenience!

Have a scroll through and see what looks relevant to you and your organisation. Feel free to forward this email to a friend who you think could stand to benefit.

Feeling overwhelmed by the number of opportunities or don’t have time to read through them all?

Upgrade your account today to gain access to our AI-assisted discovery features on our paid plans.

Service update

It’s a quick one from me this month as I’m off to the Lakes for the long weekend, it’s looking to be a scorcher! ☀️🤞 

This month we’ve been super busy wrapping up some recent development work and adjoining reporting for Innovate UK, as part of recent project funding.

We’re gradually implementing the R&D that we’ve been doing, hence the recent increase in the number of opportunities in the directory. This number should continue to increase so get in fast to see which are relevant to you!

In a nutshell, we’ve re-built the backend system from the ground up, and made the aggregation technology much more scalable and cost-effective - allowing us to aggregate more UK-wide opportunities that you can possibly benefit from too. 🙌

This also means we’re exploring scaling the product beyond the region too, to help connect even more people to relevant funding and support opportunities, so possible rebrand pending 👀 😅.

Quick reminder of the benefits of our paid AI plan

I certainly hope this newsletter proves useful to you who signed up, and anyone else you happen to forward them on to. For me, it’s a great and easy way for me to flag some of the new and exciting opportunities which are currently available. And as much as I’d love to, I sadly can’t list them all in each newsletter - the email would be too long! Beehiiv (my newsletter sender) simply wouldn’t let me as there is a maximum character limit which I have hit on a number of occasions! Also I don’t know how long it would take you all to read it - you’d be sick half way through!

I see this newsletter as a quick taster - some broad stroke highlights to whet your whistle and get you in the mood for discovery to see what opportunities might be relevant to you and your business. And believe me, I’m sure there are plenty!

The newsletter is typically a smorgasbord of random grants, accelerators, fellowships, business support programmes, competitions, and more - all with the aim of appealing to a broad and varied readership. This makes it difficult to tailor - if I go too far down one avenue, it can exclude interest from other readers. To address this, this is where the Organisation plan comes in…

The organisation plan allows you, as a user, to build a profile for your business - listing your businesses current circumstances and objectives to give our AI model context about what your business is, and what you’re looking for. Our AI is then able to scan the database using this context to match-make you with the most relevant opportunities instantly. Within seconds you can have relevant grants or support opportunities flagged to you so you can go ahead and apply.

The major benefit of doing this is that once you’ve set your profile, you can literally set it and forget, then everyday at 5pm, our AI will rescan the entire database and cross reference any opportunities that have been added that day to see if they match your previously set criteria. If they do, they’ll be added to your dashboard and better yet, you’ll receive a personalised email straight to your inbox so you don’t even need to login.

Instead of only reactively hunting for funding when you need it, you can proactively have opportunities presented to you as soon as they are discovered. It’s like having your own advisor who is constantly on the look out for relevant opportunities for you.

Of course, it may not be every day that newly launched opportunities are relevant to you, but so long as you have a subscription, whenever something comes out that is a good fit you’ll be notified about it, so you can relax and let our AI handle the busy work.

Had a change in your business objectives or ask? You can simply login, change your objectives or other parameters to generate a new search and get instant results again. Then moving forward, any daily AI checks will cross reference against these newly set parameters. It’s really as simple as that.

And if you’re an advisor or simply just prefer a conversational way of discovery, you can upgrade to our Advisor plan, where you’ll be able to chat with our live database trained chatbot. With our chatbot you can simply ask what is available for your specific business use case and it will look over the entire database to cherry pick what best matches your query, if any. And you can throw as many queries at it as you’d like, it’s always on hand to help

Either plan can be a really big time saver, so you can focus more on your business, or supporting your clients, rather than trawling through Google trying to distinguish what’s new and what it relevant. Upgrade your account today to see it in action for yourself.

Into the opportunities 👇

To make your life easier, below is a handy table of contents of all the opportunities listed in this month’s newsletter.

Just click to skip to the opportunities which tickle your fancy:

This edition's opportunity list

Immerse Early Stage Accelerator

Support Type: Accelerator

An 8-week accelerator programme designed to help founders transition from MVP stage to business growth, offering expert coaching, funding opportunities, and extensive mentoring, culminating in a Showcase Day with a £12k funding pot.

Funding Available: £12k

Application Deadline: 20/05/2025

Barclays Black Founder Accelerator with Foundervine

Support Type: Accelerator

A 12-week accelerator programme offering hands-on coaching, mentoring, strategic business audits and investor introductions designed to help Black founders and early stage ventures scale their businesses.

Application Deadline: 22/05/2025

Morgan Stanley Inclusive & Sustainable Ventures

Support Type: Accelerator Programme, Equity Investment, Grant

Provides early-stage innovators with access to capital, resources, mentorship, networking, and office space through two accelerator programs: The Lab for startup founders and The Collaborative for emerging nonprofits.

Funding Available: $250,000 or £250,000 equity investment for startups; $250,000 or £250,000 grant for nonprofits.

ARC Accelerate - ARC Accelerator

Support Type: Accelerator Programme, Grant

A 6-month accelerator programme designed to help researchers and innovators validate their venture ideas, develop sustainable business models, and prepare to pitch for funding or investment through virtual training sessions, in-person events, and market validation support.

Funding Available: Up to £62,500 award plus a separate £3,000 market validation budget

Colosseum Breakout Hackathon

Support Type: Hackathon, Accelerator, Grant, Award

A hackathon event offering pre-seed funding, accelerator opportunities, and multiple awards for innovative crypto projects.

Funding Available: $250,000 pre-seed funding with additional prize awards

Application Deadline: 16/05/2025

Impact Shakers Accelerator

Support Type: Accelerator, Investment, Business Support

A 6-month tailored programme for diverse founding teams in Europe, offering a €150k investment in equity and support, along with access to a network of impact investors and partners to help scale their impact startup.

Funding Available: €150k

NESCA - North East Space Communications Accelerator

Support Type: Grant, Innovation Fund, Accelerator

NESCA is an EPSRC-funded Place Based Impact Acceleration Account that brings together academic, civic, and industry partners to drive innovation in resilient space communications technology and skills development in the North East.

Support to Standardisation activities performed by CEN, CENELEC and ETSI

Support Type: Action Grant

Call for proposals under the Standardisation strand of the Single market Programme aimed at supporting the standardisation activities of the three European Standardisation Organisations through 27 designated topics.

Funding Available: € EUR 7 851 000

Application Deadline: 12/06/2025

Co-op Culture - Support for Co-ops and Community Businesses

Support Type: Business Support, Advisory

Co-op Culture provides consultancy and support services including feasibility studies, market, business and financial planning, community finance support, legal and organisational advice, governance audit, and social impact measurement to help co-operative, community, and social enterprises start and grow.

Startup Awards North East

Support Type: Award Event

Startup Awards North East celebrates and connects ambitious early stage founders through free workshops, mentoring, networking, and a high-profile awards ceremony.

Marsh Charitable Trust

Support Type: Grant, Awards

A charitable trust that provides long-term core funding to small charities and runs a portfolio of awards in social, cultural, and environmental causes.

Investing for Good

Support Type: Impact Investing, Blended Finance, Network

A platform that unites NGOs, charities, foundations, and investors to drive impact investment through innovative financial structures and impact data.

Scottish EDGE

Support Type: Grant, Loan, Business Funding Competition

Scotland's biggest business funding competition offering grants and loans from £10,000 to £100,000 to startups, social enterprises, and charities.

Funding Available: £10,000 - £100,000; with variants offering up to £15,000 grant-only awards.

Levy Matching Service

Support Type: Business Support

Tees Valley’s Apprenticeship Levy Matching Service facilitates funding transfers by matching levy paying companies with unspent funds to local businesses seeking to cover apprenticeship training and assessment costs.

MedTech Venture Builder Collaborative Centre of Excellence

Support Type: Business Support

A 12-month structured programme split into two stages designed to accelerate the commercial translation of promising MedTech innovations into investment-ready healthcare ventures.

Everybody Welcome initiative

Support Type: Business Support

A free support programme aimed at enhancing accessibility in the North East by offering training, digital tools, and marketing support to tourism and hospitality businesses.

Startup Navigator

Support Type: Business Support

A free online programme offering personalized guidance and resources for startup founders to convert ideas into paying customers, develop prototypes, and create effective business plans.

Everybody Welcome initiative

Support Type: Business Support, Training, Digital Support

A programme to establish the North East as the UK's most accessible tourism destination by providing businesses with free training, digital tools, and marketing support.

Spark TRY IT Programme

Support Type: Business Support, Grant

Spark TRY IT Programme is part of the Transforming West Cumbria initiative developed by Cumbria Community Foundation. It supports new and existing social enterprises in West Cumbria through business advice, mentoring, and potential financial support.

Go! London Young Entrepreneurs Start Up Programme

Support Type: Business Support, Grant

A programme for young entrepreneurs aged 16-24 in London to build and scale a business in sport, offering expert training, funding, and a supportive network.

Funding Available: Up to £15,000

Open Call: Acceleration and Post-Acceleration programmes – EIT Culture & Creativity

Support Type: Business Support, Grant

Call for applications for two tailored business support programmes (Shape and Scale) designed to accelerate the growth of start-ups and scale-ups in Europe's cultural and creative sectors with mentoring, coaching, and financial prizes.

Funding Available: Prizes up to €60,000 per award with a total prize budget of €990,000 available across both programmes.

Application Deadline: 23/05/2025

Arrow Programme

Support Type: Business Support, Innovation Support

Arrow connects businesses with academic expertise, research facilities, and match funding opportunities to drive innovation and growth.

Funding Available: Part-funding via UK Shared Prosperity Fund and match funding opportunities; details vary by project.

Future Focused Leadership Programme - Leaders stream

Support Type: Career development

A free 12-month programme supporting health and social care research leaders to enhance their leadership skills through immersive residential and virtual activities.

Funding Available: Free

Application Deadline: 03/06/2025

Development and Skills Enhancement (DSE) award cohort 7

Support Type: Career development

A postdoctoral funding opportunity that supports early to mid-career researchers in developing the skills necessary for competitive NIHR awards. It provides salary support for training and funds for development activities, including travel, conference, and mentorship costs.

Funding Available: Up to £5,000-£10,000 training costs per year FTE, up to £1,000-£2,000 for conference costs, and up to £3,000 for mentorship costs, depending on the duration of 12, 18, or 24 months.

Application Deadline: 02/07/2025

Catalyst Stockton

Support Type: Charity, Funding Support

Catalyst Stockton is a charity dedicated to helping other charities thrive by supporting the VCSE sector in Stockton-on-Tees.

Middlesbrough Voluntary Development Agency

Support Type: Community Support, Grant

MVDA supports, promotes and develops voluntary and community action in Middlesbrough through funding, training, events and infrastructure support.

Pitch & Rum Punch

Support Type: Competition, Grant

A platform for Black-owned UK-registered businesses to pitch their ventures live in front of expert judges and a diverse audience, with the opportunity to win prize money.

Funding Available: £3,000 (Growth Stage winner), £1,500 (Early Stage winner), £500 (Peoples Choice winner)

Small Business Big Break

Support Type: Competition, Marketing Support

Competition offering small businesses the chance to win a share of £300,000 in Channel 4 advertising airtime, complete TV ad production, and an exclusive marketing package including a £2,000 grant, digital marketing tools, and mentorship.

Funding Available: Share of £300,000 TV advertising airtime and a £2,000 marketing grant

Contracts for Innovation: FOAK 2025 – Platform Train Interface

Support Type: Contract

A competitive procurement competition to develop and demonstrate innovative solutions for the Platform Train Interface in the UK rail industry, including prototype development, field testing and trialling.

Funding Available: Up to £4.7 million across four themes, with individual project awards up to £200,000 inclusive of VAT

Application Deadline: 28/05/2025

Contracts for Innovation: FOAK 2025 – AI for Complex Processes

Support Type: Procurement, Contracts for Innovation

A competitive procurement opportunity offering contracts to develop, prototype, and field test innovative AI solutions for complex processes in the rail industry. Projects are part of a larger competition with a total funding pool of up to £4.7 million, with individual contracts up to £200,000.

Funding Available: Up to £200,000 per project; total competition funding of up to £4.7 million

Application Deadline: 28/05/2025

Microfund | Impact Shakers

Support Type: Investment, Cooperative

Join the Impact Shakers Microfund to finance early-stage impact businesses led by diverse founders. Members purchase shares starting at 250 EUR to invest in a portfolio of sustainable, diverse ventures and gain benefits like early access to the Impact Angel Programme and community involvement.

UK Quantum Hackathon 2025 - call for use cases

Support Type: Hackathon, Event

NQCC is seeking innovative use cases from businesses, public sector, third sector, and higher education institutions for the UK Quantum Hackathon 2025. The event offers hands-on experience with quantum computing under the mentorship of industry experts.

Funding Available: Costs for administration, meals, and venue hire are covered by the NQCC.

Application Deadline: 30/05/2025

GVS

Support Type: Volunteering, Governance, Funding Service, Health and Wellbeing, Projects, Practical Services

GVS delivers a range of quality services to support voluntary groups and communities, including volunteering opportunities, governance support, funding services, health initiatives, and practical project support.

Museum Estate and Development Fund (MEND) Round 5

Support Type: Grant

Open-access capital fund for non-national Accredited museums and local authorities in England to undertake vital infrastructure improvements and address urgent maintenance backlogs beyond routine budgets.

Funding Available: £25 million total; grants range between £50,000 and £5 million

Application Deadline: 05/06/2025

Made of Truth: BFI Doc Society Short Film Fund

Support Type: Grant

The Made of Truth fund supports emerging storytellers to produce original and bold non-fiction short documentaries ranging from 5-40 minutes. It awards up to £25,000 per project and aims to encourage innovative filmmaking that pushes boundaries in storytelling, form, and content.

Funding Available: £25000

Application Deadline: 01/05/2025

2025 to 2026 strategic Longer and Larger (sLoLa) grants: stage one

Support Type: Grant

Funding opportunity for large team-based fundamental bioscience research projects aimed at major breakthroughs in understanding living systems.

Funding Available: Total fund: £20,000,000; Minimum award: £2,000,000; 80% of full economic cost funded

Application Deadline: 20/05/2025

Facility access funding for bioscience partnerships – UKRI

Support Type: Grant

Funding to support UK business and academic partnerships in bioscience by providing access to STFC facilities and expertise to tackle industrially relevant challenges.

Funding Available: £10,000 - £200,000; Total fund of £2,100,000 with up to 100% facility costs and 80% of academic component costs funded.

Application Deadline: 05/06/2025

DARE UK next-generation trusted research environment capabilities

Support Type: Grant

Funding opportunity to prototype next-generation capabilities for federated Trusted Research Environments (TREs) by addressing missing functionality and enhancing secure sensitive data research.

Funding Available: £2,250,000 total fund; maximum award of £390,000 per project; 80% of the full economic cost funded.

Application Deadline: 05/06/2025

Applied global health partnership: stage two – UKRI

Support Type: Grant

A funding opportunity to support the development and delivery of novel applied global health research partnerships that address global health challenges and inequities through collaborative, multidisciplinary research.

Funding Available: £150,000 - £1,000,000

Application Deadline: 16/07/2025

Research Software Maintenance Fund round one: SSI

Support Type: Grant

Funding opportunity to support the maintenance of existing research software used to enable UK research.

Funding Available: £3,400,000

Application Deadline: 30/05/2025

Heritage Revival Fund

Support Type: Grant

A programme to help communities across England rescue and repurpose neglected historic buildings by supporting community organisations to take ownership and adapt local heritage assets.

Funding Available: Funding available for early stages to capital works, including feasibility studies, business plan development, design, surveys, acquisition, and renovation costs.

Application Deadline: 31/03/2026

ElevenLabs Grants

Support Type: Grant

Build human-like voices into your new product or startup with an ElevenLabs Grant that provides 3 months free access, including 11,000,000 characters per month and scale benefits.

Funding Available: 3 months free access with 11,000,000 characters per month

Social Enterprise Boost Fund

Support Type: Grant

Provides seed funding, business support and coaching to early-stage social enterprises in Sunderland and South Tyneside, offering grants ranging from £1,000 to £10,000.

Funding Available: Up to £10,000 including Kickstart grants (up to £5,000), Grow grants (up to £5,000) and Try grants (up to £1,000)

Screwfix Foundation

Support Type: Grant

The Screwfix Foundation is a grant giving charity established in 2013 that supports projects aimed at improving, repairing, and maintaining homes and community facilities for those in need across the UK.

Funding Available: Up to £5,000

Compass Wellbeing Grants

Support Type: Grant

Compass Wellbeing offers bespoke funding opportunities to support VCSE organisations in improving community wellbeing and reducing inequalities.

Funding Available: £500 to £10,000

CoSTAR Screen Lab Call: 5G Innovation in Screen Technologies

Support Type: Grant, Innovation Support

A call inviting UK-based companies to develop innovative 5G applications in the screen and performance sectors, offering cash funding, access to equipment and facilities, and research expertise.

Funding Available: Up to £35,000 cash funding per project with a total support package value of over £150k per project.

Application Deadline: 22/05/2025

Haatch - For Founders Raising Pre-Seed & Seed B2B SaaS

Support Type: Investment Fund

Haatch offers SEIS, EIS, and ESAIF investment funds for B2B SaaS companies. Their funds target startups solving critical pain points and creating significant impact, with additional operational support in areas like go-to-market strategy and scaling.

Funding Available: Pre-Seed: £100k to £250k (with an additional institutional cheque up to £85k); Seed: £300k to £800k; ESAIF fund: part of an £8 Million fund.

Angel Investment Development Programme

Support Type: Training Course

Fully-funded, intensive training course enabling participants to learn angel investing skills and join the Investor Connect Programme.

Funding Available: Fully funded by the Tees Valley Combined Authority, UK Government, and UK Shared Prosperity Fund.

Want to promote your opportunities?

If your company is interested in reaching a broad audience of founders, executives, and business decision makers, why not consider advertising your opportunities with us.

If you have any comments or feedback, I’d love to hear it!

Just respond to this email or reach out to [email protected]!

Thanks for reading,

Ben Mushen

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Wishing you a great long bank holiday weekend!

Until next time 👋

Disclaimer: The content on this email/website and all subsequent support detail pages, has been AI-generated, based upon publicly available information found on grant and/or business support websites, sourced either via URL submissions by North East Support Directory users, or via research, discovery and submission by the North East Support Directory team. The information from these websites has been extracted, processed, summarised, and categorised using the latest AI technology to produce content on the North East Support Directory that is easier for query and consumption for our users. The North East Support Directory and it's owners assume no responsibility or liability for any errors or omissions in the content of this site. The information contained is provided on an "as is" basis with no guarantees of completeness, accuracy, usefulness or timeliness. The North East Support Directory's primary objective is to provide high-level, easy to query, find, and understand information and eligibility criteria regarding grants, finance, business support, and more, so it's users can make more informed, efficient decisions on where to spend their time in reaching out for support. The North East Support Directory acknowledges that eligibility criteria can be complex, and so advises that for full, true, and up-to-date opportunity details and conditions, users should visit the corresponding grant or support programme site directly. Users can do so by clicking the 'View Opportunity' link next to each opportunity, or by searching the support title in your search engine of choice. Please note that your visit via the 'Vier Opportunity' link will be tracked by the North East Support Directory. No personal details or protected information will be tracked or guarded against your North East Support Directory account. The only data we track is the number of times that each website is visited via the North East Support Directory. The collection of this data may later be used to form insights in regards to, but not limited to; grant and/or support programme demand, appetite, and popularity; identifying 'hot' and 'cold' areas of the region, and those in need of greater support; and potentially in informing future grant and/or support offerings. These data/insights may later be shared or sold to local authorities, business support organisations, or others, to inform future grant and/or support opportunities. The North East Support Directory would like to highlight that the AI generated information on this page is generated and produced for entertainment purposes only and is for the sole use of the recipients. All supporters expressly disclaim all representations, warranties, assurance of any kind, expressed or implied. Should any user, grant-making body, support provider, or other, have any questions or query in regards to the content on this email or website, or wish to update/remove any of this AI generated content for any reason, then they should contact [email protected], and someone in the team will try to get back to your query as soon as possible.