AHRC Creative Industries Clusters Round Two: Outline Stage (Closed)

The Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) Creative Industries Clusters round two outline stage is closed. The official UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) page records an opening date of 5 January 2026 and a closing deadline of 3 March 2026 at 4:00pm UK time. This page is retained as a historical reference for the call and its requirements. It is not an invitation to submit a late outline application.

The follow-on full stage was also a separate invitation-only opportunity. UKRI opened that stage on 27 May 2026 for applicants whose outlines were successful and closed it on 22 July 2026 at 4:00pm UK time. No general application route is shown for a new Creative Industries Clusters round after those stages. Anyone seeking a future call should check the official AHRC and UKRI opportunity pages rather than relying on this archive entry.

At a glance

What round two was designed to fund

AHRC invited proposals for four new Creative Industries Clusters. Each cluster had to address a clear challenge in a specific geographical region, a creative-industry sub-sector, or both. The work also had to focus on creating new products, services, or experiences with commercial potential. The model was not a small one-off project grant. It was a large collaborative research and development programme intended to connect higher education, creative businesses, policymakers, funders, and other regional or sector stakeholders over five years.

The call sought gaps in the reach and coverage of earlier and existing clusters. Proposals were expected to help broaden the geographical reach of the portfolio or extend the cluster model into sub-sectors and challenges that had not been addressed before. The official scope connected the round to the UK Creative Industries Sector Plan, particularly growth, skills, and wider impact. Applicants also needed to address recognised sector challenges such as skills and talent development, equality, diversity and inclusion, business growth, and environmental sustainability.

At least 50% of cluster activity had to sit within the AHRC remit. AHRC also welcomed cross-disciplinary work with Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) areas and related fields, including human-computer interaction, experimental psychology, robotics and haptics, responsible artificial intelligence, extended reality, and audio, visual, speech, or sensory technologies. An interdisciplinary proposal needed to explain its participating sectors and show how the arts and humanities remained a substantial part of the programme.

The required cluster objectives went beyond commercialisation alone. A funded cluster was expected to generate economic, social, and cultural benefits; protect existing jobs and create new ones; build an ecosystem for experimental creative content and products; form long-term applied research partnerships; improve businesses access to skills and expertise; address place-based or sector issues through applied research; and embed equality and environmental sustainability throughout delivery.

Funding and budget rules

The official opportunity listed a total fund of £27,000,000 and a maximum AHRC contribution of £6,750,000 per application. Awards were for five years. AHRC would fund 80% of the full economic cost, except for devolved funding. The 80% figure therefore should not be read as a promise that every pound of every activity would be funded at that rate.

The devolved funding element was important. At least 30% of the total budget had to be devolved and that part would be funded at 100% of FEC. It could support innovative R&D activity involving freelancers, micro-businesses, and small and medium-sized enterprises. It was not intended to pay core business or general overhead costs. The host higher education institution was responsible for ensuring that this funding complied with the UK government subsidy control regime.

Applicants also had to explain partner co-investment and additional funding connected to the cluster. The official guidance distinguished co-investment secured as part of the application from later funding attracted to the programme. Acceptable contributions could include cash, capital, or in-kind support from partners and participating higher education institutions where the contribution was specifically directed to the cluster objectives. Funding already committed before the award, or existing activity that would have happened anyway, did not count. An institution’s normal 20% contribution to its FEC was also not accepted as this additional contribution.

The programme expected each cluster to secure additional partner or higher education funding equal to at least 50% of the total AHRC contribution over the award. At least 30% of that overall additional-funding target had to have been achieved by the grant midpoint for continuation through the final two and a half years. A credible outline therefore needed more than a headline budget: it needed tangible details about the source, scale, timing, and audit trail for partner commitments.

Who could apply

The lead had to be based at a UK research organisation eligible for AHRC funding. The proposal also had to name a project lead and at least one project co-lead. Each team member needed to contribute to developing the research proposal, project leadership and management, and joint publication of authored research. A person could qualify through employment by the submitting research organisation, a formal written arrangement that allowed them to work as if an employee, or a planned move to that organisation before the proposed start date.

Project co-leads were supported by the opportunity and had to be based at a UK organisation eligible to receive AHRC funding. International researchers could apply as project co-lead (international) under the AHRC rules. Other international collaborators and UK partners outside approved organisations had to be included in the appropriate project-partner role. The official eligibility guidance, rather than a general assumption about universities or creative businesses, controlled whether a particular organisation or person could be named in an application.

Higher education institutions that had led a Creative Industries Cluster in round one could not lead a proposal in this wave. They could participate as a partner on a bid led by a different eligible higher education institution or organisation. The grant could not be used to fund PhD study, although clusters were encouraged to offer placements or projects to PhD students funded through existing UKRI schemes.

The strongest eligible teams would have brought together a host higher education institution, at least one other higher education institution or independent research organisation, and industry partners integrated into governance and delivery. The official requirements also called for an existing place-based creative-industry ecosystem, industry-led challenges, a deliverable plan for co-investment, enough staff and infrastructure for a large R&D programme, flexible support for devolved R&D funding, and a robust management and governance structure.

What the outline needed to show

An outline needed to make the challenge, place or sub-sector, partners, and route to impact easy to assess. It should have explained why the challenge was recognised by industry, which research capabilities would address it, how creative businesses would participate, and how the work could produce products, services, experiences, skills, jobs, or other measurable benefits. The official scope allowed activities such as audience and user prototyping, experimental studios or labs, new business-model and intellectual-property research, routes to market, access to finance, placements, secondments, staff exchanges, professional development, co-working facilities, networking, showcases, and interactive demonstrations.

The outline also needed to establish delivery credibility. A cluster of this scale required programme management and operational support in areas such as finance, communications, and events, alongside research and industry-focused roles. Partners needed meaningful involvement rather than a list of logos. A clear steering and governance structure should have included senior higher education leaders, senior creative-industry representation, relevant local or regional organisations, sector bodies, and an AHRC representative. Applicants were also expected to describe risk management, responsible research and innovation, monitoring and evaluation, communication, a digital presence, knowledge exchange, and continuous improvement.

Equality, diversity and inclusion had to be part of the programme design, not a short afterthought. The official guidance expected a carefully considered EDI framework that responded to sector-specific barriers and covered management, governance, delivery, participation, data, and public engagement. Environmental sustainability also required its own approach and statement. Applicants should have connected those commitments to the chosen geography or sub-sector and to the actual activities they proposed.

How the application process worked

The outline stage used the new UKRI Funding Service. Je-S was not the submission system. The project lead was responsible for completing the application, but all team members and project partners were expected to contribute. Only the lead research organisation could submit the application to UKRI.

The official sequence was:

1. Confirm that the applicant is the project lead and select the start-application route on the UKRI Funding Service page.
2. Sign in or create a Funding Service account, select the organisation, verify the email address, and set a password. Organisations not listed in the service needed to contact the Funding Service helpdesk; UKRI advised allowing at least 10 working days for an organisation to be added.
3. Complete the questions in the service text boxes, saving work there or preparing responses offline for later transfer. Upload documents only where the service requested them.
4. Check the application in read-only view before sending it to the research office.
5. Send the completed application to the research office for institutional checking and editing if needed.
6. The research office submitted the checked application to UKRI.

The outline assessment covered vision, approach, applicant and team capability, outline costs, and project partners. Successful outline applicants were invited to develop a full application. The full stage was not open to general applicants: UKRI published it as a separate invitation-only opportunity. That follow-on page recorded a closing date of 22 July 2026, so there is no current application step to complete from this archive page.

Archived timeline

The official timeline opened the outline opportunity on 5 January 2026 at 9:00am UK time. The outline deadline was 3 March 2026 at 4:00pm UK time. UKRI listed outline-stage outcomes for mid-May 2026, then opened the invitation-only full funding opportunity on 27 May 2026 at 9:00am. That full stage closed on 22 July 2026 at 4:00pm. Panel interviews were expected in October 2026, with award outcomes due by the end of November 2026. Projects were required to start by 1 February 2027.

Because all general and invitation-only application windows recorded for this round have passed, do not use the dates above as a current submission schedule. They explain the status of the archived opportunity and preserve the dates a past applicant would have worked to. A new opportunity would need its own UKRI page and new official dates before this entry could be treated as open again.

Common misunderstandings

The 80% FEC figure is not the same as an 80% award paid to every partner. Devolved funding had separate 100% FEC treatment, and other costs followed standard UKRI terms. Partners also needed to demonstrate appropriate co-investment, while the programme had a separate additional-funding expectation over the life of the award.

The maximum award was not an automatic amount. A proposal could request up to £6,750,000, but it still had to justify the resources, staffing, facilities, devolved R&D, governance, and delivery plan. The £27,000,000 figure was the total fund for the call, not a sum available to each applicant.

The presence of a creative business did not by itself make a proposal eligible. The lead organisation, project lead, co-lead structure, research contributions, industry integration, AHRC remit, and round-one restrictions all mattered. Nor was this a PhD studentship scheme. Existing UKRI-funded doctoral researchers could be offered placements or projects, but the cluster award could not fund PhD study.

Finally, this was not a single-stage pitch competition. The outline was assessed first; only successful outline applicants could proceed to the full stage. Since that full stage was invitation-only and is now closed, a prospective applicant should monitor AHRC announcements for a future call rather than submit through an old link.

Official contacts and archive links

The official opportunity page remains the source for the closed outline requirements: Creative Industries Clusters: round two: outline stage. UKRI identified AHRC as the funder and listed creative@ahrc.ukri.org for questions about the specific opportunity. Funding Service and submission-system questions were directed to support@funding-service.ukri.org and the UKRI helpdesk.

For the historical next step, see the separate Creative Industries Clusters round 2 invite-only opportunity. It was only for organisations invited after a successful outline and is not a replacement open call. Check the status and dates on the official UKRI page before treating any future Creative Industries Clusters announcement as available to new applicants.

How to use this page now

Use this entry to understand the design of AHRC round two, compare a past cluster proposal with the official requirements, or prepare questions for a future call. Do not submit an outline after 3 March 2026, and do not assume that the invitation-only full-stage page accepts unsolicited applications. For a live opportunity, follow a newly published UKRI or AHRC record with its own deadline, eligibility rules, funding terms, and application link.