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Business grants

If you are an established business looking to grow, there may be grants available to help you develop your projects.

Find available grants

You can search for available grants using the following websites:

Local grants available

SWEF Programme

The SWEF fund is a national charity initiative, aimed at enhancing the activities of young business owners, innovators, and entrepreneurs. If you are aged between 18 to 30 years old, from a low-income household or facing other challenges preventing you from developing your business, and you live and work Nottinghamshire then this programme may help you with grant funding up to £2000. You can be at pre-start, start up or established trading stages as long as you have not been trading for over 2 years.

This grant can be used to help pay towards:

  • equipment that will help a business bring in a second revenue stream
  • equipment that will help a business increase production where there is proven demand
  • materials/stock for a new product line
  • prototypes
  • website/booking system build.
  • training
  • product development
  • website: SWEF grant programme
  • website: SWEF Funding

Invest to grow

The University of Derby's Invest to Grow programme provides loans and grants to support private sector businesses across the East Midlands, to innovate, grow, and create new jobs or safeguard existing jobs. Funding can cover 30% of agreed capital project costs, therefore an award of £15,000 would be for a minimum project cost of £50,000. The maximum award is £250,000. This is a Regional Growth Fund (RGF) grant, with no closing date.

Innovate UK Business Growth

Attracting funding to support innovation is a key priority for fast growing, innovative businesses that ultimately want to scale up. Innovate UK Business Growth can support you to develop your finance and funding strategy and review your application as a critical friend. This is a key part of the UK innovation agency’s investment to drive economic growth, and work with industry sector specialists that can support all types of businesses across our region.

Tech Nation

If you’re a tech entrepreneur, be it aspiring, scaling, or late stage, then Tech Nation may be able to help you through their specialised programmes. They offer peer-to-peer learning, access to world class scale-up coaches, and connections that will help solve your technology business challenges. You will also gain added exposure for your brand. They are very selective when choosing who they will accept into each programme run, however it’s completely free and they can even help you find tech investors.

Page last updated: 30 January 2025