AI Grants for Startups

The Army Applications Laboratory (AAL) DevX Autonomy program (W911NF-26-S-0040) is a continuously reviewed open call solicitation seeking innovative autonomous and unmanned systems (AUS) solutions for the U.S. Army. The program accepts submissions on a monthly basis with cutoffs on the last day of each month through August 31, 2026. Focus areas include autonomous platforms (ground, aerial, maritime), payloads, mission-enabling software and hardware, lethal and non-lethal capabilities, sustainment solutions, and subcomponents for unmanned systems. A distinctive feature is that submissions deemed award-ready can proceed directly to contracting without further competition. The submission format is streamlined: a 6-minute video pitch and structured form rather than traditional lengthy proposals. This program is particularly valuable for AI startups and robotics companies developing autonomous navigation, swarm intelligence, computer vision, or AI decision-making systems for unmanned platforms.

European Innovation Council EIC Accelerator 2026 for Deep Tech AI Startups and SMEs is sponsored by European Commission (European Innovation Council). The European Innovation Council (EIC) Accelerator is the EU's flagship blended-finance program for high-potential deep tech startups and SMEs, with 2026 cut-off dates on 7 January, 4 March, 6 May, 8 July, 2 September, and 4 November.

The European Innovation Council (EIC) Accelerator is the EU's flagship blended-finance program for high-potential deep tech startups and SMEs, with 2026 cut-off dates on 7 January, 4 March, 6 May, 8 July, 2 September, and 4 November. The Accelerator funds breakthrough innovations at Technology Readiness Levels 6-8, with AI as one of the explicit Strategic Challenges of the program (alongside semiconductors, quantum, biotech, and cleantech). Funded AI companies have included generative AI startups, AI-enabled medical devices, robotics platforms, autonomous systems, and AI for industry. Each funded company receives up to EUR 2.5 million as a non-dilutive grant for innovation activities plus EUR 1-10 million as direct equity investment from the EIC Fund (optional). Total 2026 budget is EUR 634 million split into EUR 220 million for Strategic Challenges (which include AI and digital tech) and EUR 414 million for the Open call. Strong fit for European AI startups building deep-tech products with global market potential.

The ITU AI for Good Innovation Factory is the leading United Nations-based startup pitching and acceleration platform helping AI startups grow and scale their solutions to address global challenges aligned with the UN Sustainable Development Goals. The program features monthly regional pitching sessions highlighting startups across regions and sectors leading to the AI for Good Innovation Factory Grand Finale at the AI for Good Global Summit in Geneva Switzerland in July 2026. Four winners are selected for their innovative and scalable AI-powered solutions with the top startup receiving a $20,000 grand cash prize. The program provides global pitching opportunities funding connections to investors expert mentorship exclusive networking with UN agencies and industry leaders and media exposure. Regional events are held worldwide including in Turkey Africa and other regions to identify top startups. This competition is open to ventures leveraging AI machine learning and advanced algorithms to address real-world issues in areas such as healthcare climate sustainability education agriculture disaster response and digital inclusion. This is distinct from the Google.org AI for Social Good awards which provide larger grants to established organizations and from the Technovation AI Ventures Accelerator which focuses specifically on young women.

Nebius AI Lift, announced at NVIDIA GTC 2025 and running through 2026, offers eligible NVIDIA Inception members up to 150,000 US dollars in cloud credits for Nebius AI cloud infrastructure, plus 10,000 dollars for inference workloads, alongside AI technical expertise and support. The programme's defining structural feature is that it is gated on NVIDIA Inception membership rather than being directly open, which creates a two-step application path that startups frequently miss. NVIDIA Inception itself is free, takes no equity, has no fees, no cohorts and no deadlines, and requires only that the company be officially incorporated, less than ten years old, employ at least one developer and maintain a working website, while excluding consulting firms, cryptocurrency companies, cloud service providers, resellers and public companies. Once admitted, an Inception member gains access to a benefits portal through which partner cloud credits can be requested, with Nebius AI Lift among the largest single offers available and the AWS Activate partner path another. The practical implication is that joining NVIDIA Inception is the highest-leverage first move for any AI startup seeking compute, because it unlocks multiple partner credit programmes from one free application rather than requiring separate negotiations with each provider. Beyond credits, AI Lift provides guaranteed priority access to current AI infrastructure and early access to the NVIDIA Blackwell platform on Nebius instances, plus discounted long-term commitments for startups scaling beyond the credit allocation.

Startup SG Tech is Enterprise Singapore's flagship grant for early-stage deep-tech startups commercializing proprietary technology, including AI, robotics, agentic systems, and machine learning. Proof of Concept (POC) grants up to SGD 250,000 fund early R&D feasibility, while Proof of Value (POV) grants up to SGD 500,000 fund later-stage prototyping and validation with industry partners. AI startups using Singapore as a regional Asia-Pacific base can use Startup SG Tech to fund model development, vertical AI applications, agentic deployments, and integration with Singapore's National AI Strategy 2.0 priorities.

Scaleway, the iliad Group cloud arm operating the Jean Zay-affiliated EU sovereign cloud, provides early-stage European AI startups up to EUR 36,000 in cloud credits. The program supports companies running NVIDIA H100 SXM clusters, AI managed inference endpoints, object storage, and serverless inference on European sovereign infrastructure. Members are also offered access to Scaleway AI clusters and onboarding to the iliad AI ecosystem (including Kyutai). Designed for pre-seed to Series A teams committed to building on European AI infrastructure.

DigitalOcean Hatch (formerly Startup Launchpad) provides AI and ML startups up to $100,000 in cloud credits and three months of free access to an 8x NVIDIA H100 GPU droplet for training and inference. The program targets pre-seed through Series A startups building on DigitalOcean infrastructure (including Paperspace by DigitalOcean) and includes technical support, mentorship, and ecosystem partnership benefits. Applications can be submitted directly or through partner incubators and accelerators worldwide.

The EuroHPC Joint Undertaking's AI Factories give European AI companies free access to some of the largest GPU systems in the world, and the Industrial Innovation access route is the one built specifically for SMEs and startups rather than for academic consortia. It runs three tracks of increasing scale. Playground Access provides limited entry-level resources on a first-in-first-out basis with access granted within two working days and onboarding support for users new to HPC - it exists to let a team benchmark and port before committing to a proposal. Fast Lane Access serves experienced HPC users needing up to 50,000 GPU hours. Large Scale Access covers applications requiring more than 50,000 GPU hours, allocated for up to one year, with cut-off dates running through 4 January 2027. All three are open and free of charge to AI SMEs including startups pursuing innovation, which is the critical distinction from the separate AI for Science and Collaborative Projects mode aimed at publicly funded research; other industrial users can still access the machines but on commercial pay-per-use terms. For a European AI startup, this is close to the largest non-dilutive compute resource available anywhere, and the practical route in is almost always Playground first, then a Large Scale proposal built on the benchmarking data that Playground produced. Applications are submitted through the EuroHPC access portal.

The Solutions Marketplace is IARPA's attempt to remove the single biggest barrier between a small AI company and the intelligence community: the multi-month proposal burden required before anyone in government even sees what you built. Instead of a written proposal against a specific BAA topic, innovators submit a five-minute unclassified video pitch and basic supporting information through an online portal. Submissions are reviewed by subject matter experts drawn from the IC, industry and academia; those judged awardable are tagged by strategic focus area and made visible to authorized government users across the community, who can then pursue the technology through their own acquisition vehicles. The mechanics matter for planning: the call is open on a rolling basis from August 1, 2026 through July 31, 2027, with assessments conducted monthly, so there is no single deadline to hit and a company can time a submission to when its capability is demonstrable rather than when a solicitation happens to open. Eligibility is deliberately wide - open to all U.S.-based companies traditional and nontraditional, large and small business, new entrants, universities, nonprofits and individuals - which makes it one of the lowest-friction federal entry points for an AI startup with no prior government past performance. The important caveat is what the Marketplace is not. It is not itself a grant or a funded award; being tagged awardable creates visibility and a rapid acquisition pathway, not money. Companies should treat a submission as business development into the IC with an unusually cheap cost of entry, and should be prepared for the follow-on contracting effort with whichever IC element expresses interest. Submissions go through iarpamarketplace.us, with program information at iarpa.gov/marketplace, and IARPA posted a corresponding solicitation notice on SAM.gov. Submitted material must be unclassified.

Canada Regional Artificial Intelligence Initiative (RAII) for AI Commercialization and Adoption is sponsored by Government of Canada (Regional Development Agencies including PrairiesCan, PacifiCan, CED, FedDev Ontario, ACOA, CanNor). The Regional Artificial Intelligence Initiative (RAII) is a Government of Canada program delivering $200 million in AI funding through the country's regional development agencies. Under Budget 2024, PrairiesCan alone received $33.

Modal Labs offers two recurring credit grant tracks for AI builders: Modal Startups (up to $50,000 in serverless GPU credits for pre-seed through Series A AI/ML companies, with no upfront commitment required for accepted applicants) and Modal for Academics (up to $25,000 in serverless GPU credits for university researchers, with smaller targeted grants for course instructors and student-led research). Modal's serverless platform spans H100, A100, A10G, L4, and L40S GPU types, with pay-per-second billing, autoscaling, and lightweight Python deployment. Modal is particularly suited for inference serving, fine-tuning, retrieval-augmented generation, and burst-training workloads where startups want to avoid upfront cluster commitments. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis. Strong fit for early-stage AI startups, university machine-learning labs, course instructors, and individual researchers needing flexible serverless GPU access for inference and fine-tuning workloads.

Scaleway's Startup Program offers French and European AI/ML startups EU-based sovereign cloud infrastructure with cost coverage of up to EUR 36,000, customer success manager support, and access to the Startup community. Tiers are based on company maturity: 'Pioneer' (early-stage with up to EUR 1,000 credits for multi-cloud), 'Adventurer' (EUR 1,500/month for 6 months), and 'Explorer' (higher allocations for growth-stage). Scaleway operates sovereign data centers in Paris, Amsterdam, and Warsaw with H100 GPU clusters, AI labs, and serverless inference, positioning it as a European alternative for sovereign AI workloads. Strong fit for EU AI startups requiring GDPR-compliant infrastructure and EU data residency for training, fine-tuning, or inference.

The OVHcloud Fast Forward AI Accelerator provides European AI startups with €50,000 in free GPU credits and access to OVHcloud's AI solutions, on top of the Startup Program's cloud credits (up to €100,000 at Scale level). The program includes AI technology deep-dives to solve technical challenges, workshops covering AI development, sales strategy, investor readiness, and PR training. OVHcloud operates sovereign European cloud infrastructure ensuring compliance with EU data protection laws (GDPR), making it attractive for startups requiring data sovereignty. Applicants must first be members of OVHcloud's Startup Program (active for at least 3 months) and demonstrate a genuine need for GPUs and AI solutions. Preference is given to Scale-level members. OVHcloud offers NVIDIA H100 GPUs for AI workloads. The program operates on a rolling basis with applications accepted at any time and decisions communicated within one week. This is one of the few European-sovereign cloud programs specifically offering GPU credits for AI startups.

Google Cloud's startup program provides substantial cloud computing credits specifically designed for AI and ML companies. The program offers access to cutting-edge GPU and TPU hardware including NVIDIA H100, A3 Ultra instances, and TPU v5e accelerators. Credits can be used for AI model training, inference, data processing, and general cloud infrastructure. The tiered program scales credits based on company stage and backing, making it one of the largest compute credit programs available for AI startups building on foundation models, computer vision, NLP, and other AI applications.

DigitalOcean Hatch is a non-dilutive AI startup program providing up to $100,000 in DigitalOcean compute credits over 12 months, plus up to 3 months of free NVIDIA H100 GPU Droplet access for AI model training and inference. Members get preferred GPU pricing ($1.90/GPU/hour for H100s), free Standard-tier paid support for 15 months, and personalized guidance from DigitalOcean's AI product managers and solutions engineers. Designed for AI-native companies building foundation models, inference services, agent platforms, and applied AI products needing affordable scalable GPU compute.

TTT.AI pre-seed fund is sponsored by LUMO Labs (Consortium with Dutch universities and university medical centers). This pre-seed fund, part of a subsidy from the Netherlands Enterprise Agency's (RVO) Technology Transfer (TTT) scheme, aims to advance the availability and relevance of AI innovations within society by providing funding and knowledge transfer to early-stage AI startups.

AI Innovation Grant for Small Business is sponsored by Lenovo Evolve Small. Lenovo Evolve Small offers a grant to small businesses, including a cash award and a customized AI technology package, along with mentorship opportunities. The program aims to provide tools and resources to help small businesses thrive in the age of AI.

The UK Sovereign AI Fund makes direct equity investments in British AI startups from pre-seed to growth stage, backed by a £500 million total fund. Beyond capital, selected companies receive access to the UK's largest AI supercomputers (up to 1 million GPU-hours each), fast-tracked visa sponsorship for global AI talent, curated national datasets, and grants through a strategic-assets program. Priority sectors are compute and infrastructure, novel model architectures, AI in health and life sciences, scientific discovery, and trust, safety and assurance.

PacifiCan, the Government of Canada's economic development agency for British Columbia, offers the Regional Artificial Intelligence Initiative (RAII) to support projects that use AI to improve human health, environmental health, and economic resilience across various sectors. Businesses can receive up to CAD $3 million (approximately USD $2.2 million) per project, while not-for-profit organizations can receive up to CAD $5 million (approximately USD $3.65 million) per project. The program supports AI commercialization, AI adoption in key sectors, advancement of BC's AI ecosystem, and projects that generate revenue and create high-quality jobs. Applications are accepted on a continuous basis.

The OVHcloud Startup Program provides European and international AI startups with up to EUR 100,000 in free cloud credits on Europe's leading sovereign cloud infrastructure. The program specifically offers access to NVIDIA A100 and L40S GPU instances hosted entirely within EU data centers, making it uniquely valuable for AI companies that need GDPR-compliant compute resources not subject to the U.S. CLOUD Act. OVHcloud implements technical and organizational measures to protect data hosted by EU-based customers against interference from authorities outside the European Union. Beyond credits, participants receive one-on-one support from a regional manager, personalized technical guidance for architecture and scaling, and access to OVHcloud's partner ecosystem. Critically, OVHcloud takes no equity in exchange for the credits — a significant differentiator from some accelerator-style compute programs. The program supports AI training, inference, generative AI workloads, and 3D rendering with Ada Lovelace GPU performance. This is one of the few large-scale GPU credit programs specifically designed for data sovereignty compliance.

The AI2 Incubator is the Allen Institute for AI's start-up accelerator that co-founds applied AI companies with founders building product-focused AI businesses on top of state-of-the-art research. The program provides up to $600,000 in seed capital, approximately $1 million in cloud compute credits, deep engineering and ML scientist support, founder coaching, fundraising guidance, and access to Ai2's research portfolio. Selected teams spend 4-18 months working alongside AI2 scientists in Seattle to validate technical risks and move toward product-market fit. The incubator co-founds about 15 applied AI startups per year across verticals including generative AI applications, vertical SaaS, developer tools, science and biotech AI, and enterprise AI. Equity is taken; this is structured as co-founding rather than a traditional grant, but the cash and compute support are substantially non-dilutive in spirit (very high equity given to founders relative to typical seed investments).

AI Training Pilot Program for New York State Workforce (2026) is sponsored by State of New York. New York State is expanding artificial intelligence education and training to state employees to equip them with skills to harness emerging AI technologies for the public good. This pilot program is part of a broader initiative to ensure equitable growth of the AI industry in New York, including training students for AI-enabled jobs, funding NY AI startups, and supporting small businesses with AI adoption.

Lenovo Evolve Small Grant is sponsored by Lenovo (in partnership with Goodie Nation). The Lenovo Evolve Small program champions small businesses by providing aid, mentorship, and community. This grant includes financial assistance, an AI technology package, and personalized mentorship to assist with personal, professional, and business development. The program focuses on helping small businesses thrive in the age of AI.

The Google AI Futures Fund is a strategic initiative from Google Labs that invests in and collaborates with early-to-mid-stage startups building ambitious AI applications. Unlike traditional grant programmes, the AI Futures Fund operates on a rolling basis with no fixed application window or batch/cohort model — Google considers investment opportunities continuously. Selected startups receive a comprehensive package including early access to select AI models from Google DeepMind such as Gemini (language), Imagen (image generation), and Veo (video generation), hands-on support from researchers, engineers, product managers, designers, and go-to-market specialists from Google DeepMind and Google Labs, Google Cloud credits with dedicated technical support, and the opportunity to seek direct equity investment from Google. Investment check sizes vary based on the company's stage and needs, typically targeting early to mid-stage companies with flexibility for later-stage opportunities. In 2026, Google partnered with Accel for an India-focused AI Futures Fund cohort (Atoms AI Cohort 2026), offering up to $2 million per startup as a co-investment. The programme has global scope and has funded startups across North America, Europe, India, and other regions. The fund focuses on startups building transformative applications of generative AI, foundation models, and multimodal AI across industries.

The Scaleway Startup Program provides up to EUR 36,000 in cloud credits to early-stage European AI startups, with access to NVIDIA H100 GPU instances for AI training and inference workloads. Scaleway is a French cloud provider offering EU-sovereign infrastructure with full GDPR compliance, making it an attractive option for European AI startups that need GPU compute resources while maintaining data sovereignty. The program requires no equity stake and is designed to help early-stage companies access the compute infrastructure needed for AI model development, fine-tuning, and deployment. Scaleway's data centers are located in France and the Netherlands, providing low-latency European GPU access for AI workloads.

Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) / Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) - Artificial Intelligence topic is sponsored by National Science Foundation (NSF). This program supports startups and small businesses in translating AI research into products and services, including AI systems and AI-based hardware, for the public good. It focuses on cutting-edge technologies in deep learning-based AI systems and AI-based hardware.

The UK Sovereign AI Fund is a £500 million state-backed initiative providing AI startups with equity investments of £1M-£10M at market-rate terms alongside up to 1 million fully-funded GPU hours on the UK's largest AI supercomputers. The Fund also offers fast-tracked visa support for recruiting global AI talent and access to UK research institutions, curated national datasets, and government contracts up to £10M. Aimed at startups from pre-seed to growth stage, the Fund is positioned to help British AI companies start, scale, and compete globally. The Fund launched in April 2026 as part of the UK government's broader AI Opportunities Action Plan and Sovereign AI Unit, backed by up to £500M in total commitments.

Small Business Technology Transfer Program (2026) is a grant from the federal government (administered via SBIR.gov) that funds cooperative research and development between small for-profit businesses and non-profit research institutions. Awards range from ,000 to ,700,000 across three phases: Phase I for feasibility, Phase II for technology development, and Phase III for commercialization. Funding is non-dilutive and equity-free. Eligible applicants are U.S.-based small businesses with fewer than 500 employees partnering with research institutions to advance mission-critical federal R&D needs.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) Topic – NSF SBIR is sponsored by National Science Foundation (NSF) Small Business Innovation Research Program (SBIR). This program supports small businesses developing innovative AI technologies, with an emphasis on next-generation AI that is safe, reliable, fair, robust, privacy-preserving, and efficient. It also includes cutting-edge hardware technologies for sustainable AI.

Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR)/Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) - Artificial Intelligence is sponsored by U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF). Supports startups and small businesses developing cutting-edge technologies in deep learning-based AI systems and AI-based hardware. This includes novel devices and architectures for sustainable AI, edge devices, and AI technologies that lead to better hardware systems.

Mediaocean AI Ventures is sponsored by Mediaocean (backed by Mediaocean, CVC Capital Partners, TA Associates, and Eterna Growth Partners). A corporate investment initiative to fund and scale AI startups building advertising and marketing technology. It targets the shift toward agentic AI in advertising, where software agents automate tasks like campaign planning, media buying, and measurement.

R&D Tax Incentive is sponsored by Australian Taxation Office (administered by AusIndustry and the Australian Taxation Office). Provides tax offsets to encourage companies to conduct eligible R&D activities, including those related to AI. Small businesses undertaking AI development for democratizing data in the NFP sector could be eligible for this ongoing incentive.

San José AI Incentive Program is sponsored by City of San José. The City of San José has opened applications for grants for early-stage AI startups with an active or planned employee presence in San José, aiming to grow the AI ecosystem in Silicon Valley. Innovators awarded grants will join San José's robust tech scene.

Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) / Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) - Artificial Intelligence (AI) is sponsored by U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF). This program supports startups and small businesses to translate AI research into products and services, including AI systems and AI-based hardware, for the public good. It emphasizes next-generation AI technologies that are safe, reliable, fair, robust, privacy-preserving, and efficient. The program also includes cutting-edge hardware technologies for sustainable AI and intelligent edge devices. While not specific to hospitality, innovation in AI can be applied to the sector.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) - Small Business Innovation Research / Small Business Technology Transfer (SBIR/STTR) Program is sponsored by National Science Foundation (NSF). America's Seed Fund, powered by the NSF, funds U. S. -based startups and small businesses developing deep technologies with commercial and societal potential, including cutting-edge AI systems and AI-based hardware.

America's Seed Fund – NSF SBIR (Artificial Intelligence) Phase I is a grant from the National Science Foundation that funds for-profit U.S. small businesses developing novel artificial intelligence technologies with strong commercial potential and societal impact. Since 1977, America's Seed Fund (powered by NSF) has supported approximately 400 companies per year to bring deep technologies from research to market. Phase I awards are typically up to $275,000 and support early-stage R&D to demonstrate technical feasibility. Eligible applicants are U.S. for-profit small businesses with fewer than 500 employees and majority U.S. ownership, developing innovative AI technologies in any sub-topic area. The program welcomes first-time entrepreneurs from all 50 states and U.S. territories.

NSF SBIR: Artificial Intelligence (AI) is sponsored by National Science Foundation (NSF). This topic focuses on cutting-edge technologies in deep learning-based AI systems and AI-based hardware. It emphasizes next-generation AI technologies that are safe, reliable, fair, robust against adversaries, privacy-preserving, and efficient. It also includes cutting-edge hardware for sustainable AI and AI technologies that lead to better hardware systems.

AI Innovation Package / GenAI4EU Initiative is sponsored by European Commission. The AI innovation package aims to bolster the development and adoption of trustworthy Artificial Intelligence across the EU, supporting AI start-ups and SMEs by facilitating access to supercomputing resources, providing financial aid, and creating a supportive ecosystem for inno…

SBIR Phase I: A Cyber Assured Space Internet Device is sponsored by Department of Defense (DoD). This SBIR Phase I project aims to develop technology needed to accelerate the commercial development of hybrid space and terrestrial communications architectures, in-space manufacturing, and industrial infrastructure, with a focus on cybersecurity in space. While not explicitly 'AI software,' it involves advanced technology development that could incorporate AI.