ARIA is an R&D funding agency that is built to unlock scientific and technological breakthroughs for everyone’s benefit. Our success will be measured by the lives, industries, and communities transformed by ARIA’s work.
ARIA is a non-departmental public body, sponsored by the Department for Science, Innovation + Technology.
We were created via the ARIA Act to pursue bold, long-term goals, providing a high degree of independence in decision making and distribution of funding.
ARIA is backed by £800M over our first four years.
Our first cohort of Programme Directors has been recruited to develop and launch multi-year programmes. We will aim to launch the first of our programmes by the end of 2023.
We were designed to catalyse transformative impact on a decadal timeline. Our success will be measured by the lives, industries, and communities transformed by ARIA’s work – change on that scale will take time.
We have an experienced Board of Directors who provide critical oversight over our strategy and governance.
We are accountable to Select Committees and Parliament, subject to scrutiny by the National Audit Office, and required to submit an annual report and statement of accounts to be laid before Parliament.
We will transparently publish information on our programmatic activities, including regional data, spend and delivery partners.
PDs will engage with communities across the R&D ecosystem from the earliest stages of programme development onwards, through workshops, soliciting feedback, and consultation.
You can find more about how we’ll engage here.
Right now we’re focused on developing and launching our first cohort of programmes, so it’s too early to say when recruitment for our second cohort will happen.
Our primary focus will be on funding those who are based in the UK, but funding will be available to organisations outside the UK if we believe it can significantly boost the potential impact or success of a programme that can benefit the UK.
We want conversations to be as open as possible but where confidentiality is required ARIA will have robust confidentiality arrangements in place.
Open and transparent competition will be our default for sourcing all ARIA research funding recipients. However in certain circumstances, a direct award may be appropriate if in line with our commercial operating model.
We welcome solicited applications from across the R&D ecosystem, including individuals, universities, research institutions, small, medium and large companies, charities and public sector research organisations.
Scientific and technological breakthroughs often rely on a mix of academic and industrial capabilities that can be hard to find in a single organisation, so our programmes will deliberately reach across disciplines, sectors and institutions.
Unless otherwise stated in the funding call, organisations outside of the UK and Northern Ireland can apply for ARIA funding.
Unless otherwise stated in the funding call, individuals can apply for ARIA funding.
We will publish information on our programmatic activities, including recipients of funding.
We’ll openly publish our progress at each stage of programme development, so check what we’re working on for opportunities to engage in specific programme areas.
We will also be sharing updates on our Substack, so subscribe and follow us there.