Area of investment and support

Area of investment and support: Fund for International Collaboration

Completed area of investment and support

This area is complete and will have no future activity.

This now closed fund supported international collaborations, enhanced the UK’s ability to build new, and strengthen existing, partnerships with global research and innovation leaders.

There were over 20 partner countries involved in our bilateral and multilateral programmes.

Budget:: £160 million
Partners involved:: UK Research and Innovation (UKRI)

The scope and what we're doing

The Fund for International Collaboration (FIC) was a £160 million fund supporting international collaborations. It enhanced the UK’s ability to build new, and strengthen existing, partnerships with global research and innovation leaders.

We worked with the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) to identify key partner countries for collaboration, including:

Australia
Japan
Canada
South Korea
the US

Overall, there were over 20 partner countries involved in our bilateral and multilateral programmes to date.

In February 2022 it was announced that the Fund for International Collaboration, alongside the Global Challenges Research Fund and the Newton Fund, will not continue in their current format, but legal commitments will be met until their natural conclusion.

UKRI confirmed that it would support projects still running as part of these funds for the remainder of their grant period. See our update statement on GCRF and Newton following the spending review 2021.

Why we're doing it

To find out more about how we enhanced the UK’s excellence in research and innovation through global engagement, read our publication on the Fund for International Collaboration.

FIC underwent a fund-level evaluation in three phases. For more information, read the findings in:

Past projects, outcomes and impact

The fund supported more than 30 international collaborative programmes of research, innovation and infrastructure across UKRI’s remit. Examples include:

supporting business-led collaboration on research and innovation with global partners under the EUREKA framework
UK-US collaboration to advance and accelerate crop breeding
building competitive and resilient economies through the UK-Canada collaboration on artificial intelligence
supporting cutting-edge research to tackle incurable degenerative conditions through the UK-Japan Regenerative Medicine initiative
UK taking the lead to develop our understanding of the universe through the Advanced Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatories (aLIGO) project
supporting doctoral students to develop into global citizens through the UK-Canada Doctoral Exchange scheme
UK-China collaboration strengthening creative industries and delivering economic, cultural and intellectual benefits to both countries

Impact

The signing of the UK-Switzerland government to government ‘memorandum of understanding’ attracted attention from the media and resulted in a BBC News article, UK-Swiss science deal as both barred from EU scheme.  

The outcomes of the UKRI and Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) funding opportunity were announced by UKRI and SNSF (Launch of thirty projects thanks to Switzerland-UK collaboration).  

Resulting from AHRC’s ‘Digital Transformation in Humanities Research: UK-Ireland Collaboration in the Digital Humanities’ programme, the Make Film History project has been nominated for the Learning on Screen Awards in the ‘Online Educational Resource’ category.

Films made by Shamica Ruddock and Benjamin Rupprecht and supported through the scheme have also been nominated in the ‘Creative Reuse’ and ‘Postgraduate’ categories.

Learning on Screen Awards: nominations 2023

Last updated: 2 December 2025