Energy Frontier Research Centers (EFRC) Re-competition 2026

The ASCR Leadership Computing Challenge (ALCC) is a grant from the Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Science that funds access to time on DOE's leadership-class supercomputers, including Frontier, Aurora, Polaris, and Perlmutter. The program prioritizes high-risk, high-payoff scientific computing projects aligned with DOE mission areas, responses to national emergencies, and efforts to broaden access to advanced HPC resources. Eligible applicants include researchers from universities, industry, and government agencies; DOE sponsorship is not required. Allocation periods run for one year from July 1, 2026 to June 30, 2027, with the application deadline on November 1, 2026. Renewals of up to three years are possible. This is a compute resource allocation, not a cash grant.

The AI Gigafactories Call is the largest single AI funding instrument in Europe and one of the least like a grant. EuroHPC JU is not funding research projects; it is co-investing in the construction of up to seven physical facilities that combine massive computing power with state-of-the-art AI processors, the necessary software and cloud technology stacks, high-bandwidth connectivity and energy-efficient data centres, to provide frontier AI training, fine-tuning and inference as sovereign European services. The applicant profile follows from that: applications are open to consortia or Special Purpose Vehicles bringing together companies, public entities, investors and other partners, and a facility may sit within a single Member State or be distributed across several. This is a call for infrastructure developers and capital syndicates, not for research groups. The financial structure is co-funding rather than full funding - successful projects receive differing levels of EU and national support reflecting the size and range of sovereign services they commit to provide, against an EU and national envelope of up to 10,000,000,000 euros that is expected to mobilise at least 20,000,000,000 euros of private investment. The timeline is long and worth planning around: the submission deadline is 12 November 2026, competitive evaluation follows, selections are expected in early 2027, and operations are to commence within 18 months of selection. Note that the AI Gigafactories are a tier above the existing AI Factories - EuroHPC currently oversees 19 AI Factories and 13 AI Factory Antennas that provide free access to SMEs and startups - so organisations wanting to use European AI compute rather than build it should look to the AI Factories access calls instead. Submission is through the EU Tenders and Funding Portal.

The EuroHPC Joint Undertaking launched its AI Gigafactories call on 30 July 2026 as a joint procurement, not a conventional research grant, and that distinction shapes who should respond. It seeks consortia or Special Purpose Vehicles bringing together companies, public entities, investors and other partners to establish up to seven AI Gigafactories across Europe - facilities that combine massive computing power and state-of-the-art AI processors with the software and cloud technology stacks, high-bandwidth connectivity and energy-efficient data centres needed to deliver frontier AI training, fine-tuning and inference at scale. This is the tier above the 19 AI Factories and 13 AI Factory Antennas EuroHPC already oversees, which serve SMEs and startups with free customised support; the Gigafactories are aimed at frontier-scale sovereign capacity. The financing model is blended: EuroHPC expects total private investment of more than EUR 20,000,000,000 across the EU, with successful projects receiving varying levels of EU and national co-funding calibrated to the size and range of sovereign services offered. Per-facility EU contributions have deliberately not been published, so applicants must build their own capital stack and negotiate co-funding rather than apply against a fixed grant envelope. Facilities may be established in a single Member State or span several, and cross-border developments are explicitly welcomed. The reference is EUROHPC-2026-CEI-AIGF-01 and the deadline is 12 November 2026 at 16:00 CET. Realistically this is a call for infrastructure-grade consortia with credible access to billions in capital, energy siting and hyperscale operations experience - not for individual research groups or early-stage startups, who should instead route through the existing AI Factories network.