Bridging Civil and Military Innovation: New Funding for Autonomous Aviation

Innovate UK, part of UK Research and Innovation (UKRI), will invest up to £10 million to develop aviation technologies and systems that support both civil and military use cases. This is subject to a sufficient number of high quality applications being received.

These will be to support a resilient UK national security and defence ecosystem.

The aim of this competition is to support development of, and reduce barriers to the adoption and commercialisation of, key dual use aviation technologies.

These are specifically Uncrewed Aircraft System (UAS), hybrid electric Vertical Take off and Landing aircraft (eVTOLs), hybrid electric Conventional Take off and Landing aircraft (eCTOLs), and other swarming, collaborative or autonomous aviation systems.

Dual use items, including software and technology, are items which can be used for both civil and military purposes.

We are seeking innovative projects that will build on current state of the art technologies and progress towards commercialisation and operational readiness. Your application should also consider the potential to manufacture at scale and specific end user and operational needs.

This competition will support ambitious companies developing technology ideas with the potential to scale.

This competition also supports cross government priorities, including the government’s objectives of achieving routine Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) UAS operations from 2027, promoting public sector UAS adoption and achieving commercial piloted eVTOL operations from 2028.

Your project must progress the development, integration or operational readiness of aviation systems or capabilities, at technology readiness level (TRL) 5 or above at system level, in one or more of the following:

• systems or technologies developed for both civilian and military use
• systems or technologies developed for civilian use cases that are being adapted or integrated for military use
• systems or technologies developed for military use cases that are being adapted or integrated for civilian use

The technology being developed must have a clear pathway to commercialisation in civil and defence markets through strong alignment with key government stakeholder priorities.

Your project must include a UK customer or operator as a partner. You must clearly state in your scope answer which partner meets this requirement.

Your project can include flight activities where this adds benefit to your project. If it does, then these must be performable within existing regulatory approvals or approvals obtainable by a clear and supported route within your project timeline. You must demonstrate in your application very clear understanding of how this will be achievable within the project duration.

In applying to this competition, you are entering into a competitive process. This competition has a funding limit, so we may not be able to fund all the proposed projects. It may be the case that your project scores highly but we are still unable to fund it.

Our experience from similar competitions suggests that you could have 15% chance of success.

We consider a range of factors when determining whether to provide funding to applicants. This includes an assessment of prior conduct, such as any outstanding payments owed to Innovate UK or UKRI. Such factors may influence the funding decision, potentially resulting in a refusal of funding or an award subject to additional scrutiny.

We also reserve the right to adjust funding allocations for any of our competitions. This may be in response to changes in policy, portfolio funding considerations or broader government funding decisions.

This competition closes at 11am UK time on the deadline stated in this Innovate UK competition brief. We cannot guarantee other government or third party sites will always show the correct competition information.

Funding type

Grant

Project size

Your project’s total eligible grant funding request must be between £300,000 and £1.25 million.

Accessibility and Inclusion

We welcome and encourage applications from people of all backgrounds and are committed to making our application process accessible to everyone. This includes making reasonable adjustments for people who have a disability or a long-term condition and face barriers applying to us.

You can contact us at any time to ask for guidance.

We recommend you contact us as soon as possible before this competition’s closing date to allow us to put the most suitable support in place. The support we can provide may be limited if you contact us close to the competition deadline.

You can contact Innovate UK by email or call 0300 321 4357. Our phone lines are open from 9am to 12pm and 2pm to 5pm UK time, Monday to Friday (excluding bank holidays).

Key dates (both competitions):
• Competitions open: 5 May 2026
• Online briefing event: 11 May 2026
• Competitions close: 3 June 2026