Most grant round-ups are written by people who've never applied for one. This isn't that.

Over two years building GoPlugable — a community EV charger-sharing platform — my co-founder Maebh and I applied to dozens of grants, pitch competitions, and accelerators across Ireland, the UK, and Europe. We won some. We lost more than we won. Between the ones we secured, we raised over €160,000 without giving away equity.

This is the real list — what we applied for, what we won, what we lost, and what I'd actually recommend to another product founder starting from Ireland today.

Why this list is different

Every entry below either came from our own funding tracker or from direct experience applying. Where I don't have firsthand experience with a scheme, I say so. Nothing here is generic "here are some grants that exist" content — it's what a real, two-person, pre-revenue Irish product startup actually pursued.

Grants and programmes we won

These are the ones that paid out — cash, non-dilutive funding, or high-value non-equity support.

ProgrammeWhat it's worthNotesLink
Local Enterprise Office (LEO) Feasibility Grant €6,000 The first grant we secured — designed exactly for testing whether an idea is viable before you commit fully. Available through your local LEO regardless of sector. Find your LEO →
New Frontiers Phase 2 (Enterprise Ireland) €15,000 tax-free founder allowance + non-cash support package worth over €40,000 The single most valuable programme on this list. Six months, full-time, no equity taken. Delivered at 18 locations nationwide through Enterprise Ireland. This is where GoPlugable got real structure, mentoring, and investor-readiness. newfrontiers.ie →
Enterprise Ireland Student Entrepreneur Awards — High Achieving Merit Award €5,000 Open to students and recent graduates building a business alongside study — relevant if you're doing what I was doing (a master's, full-time work, and a startup, simultaneously). enterprise-ireland.com →
Techstart NI — Catalyst Proof of Concept Grant Up to £10,000 Cross-border relevant if you're building in the island of Ireland more broadly — Techstart supports early-stage tech ventures in Northern Ireland. —
Techstart NI — Concept Plus Grant Up to £35,000 The larger follow-on grant in the Techstart pipeline, for ventures that have validated further. techstartgrants.com →
QUB Dragons' Den (Queen's University Belfast) £10,000 University-run pitch competition — worth checking if your local university runs an equivalent; many do. qubsu.org →
Invent 23 £25,000 Regional innovation competition — one of the larger single cash prizes we won. invent23.co →
TDI Grant (Invest NI) £7,500 Relevant for early-stage tech ventures with a Northern Ireland connection. —
All-Ireland Sustainability Awards Award + recognition (no direct cash, high PR value) We won Best Small Business, and my co-founder Maebh won the Silver Young Changemaker award. Worth entering for press exposure alone — this is where the "small wins build credibility" strategy from the book paid off directly. allirelandsustainability.com →
Grants and programmes we applied for but didn't win

Included deliberately — knowing what's competitive (and how competitive) is as useful as knowing what pays out.

ProgrammeNotes
Enterprise Ireland Pre-Seed Start Fund Got close — a strong signal that the fund is realistic for pre-revenue product startups, even if we didn't land it that round. Worth reapplying at a later stage.
Accelerate Green Applied twice; didn't progress either time. Sector-specific (green/cleantech), competitive.
Seedcorn Investor Readiness Competition Reached Phase 3 before being cut — a genuinely useful process for sharpening an investor pitch, win or not.
Innovate UK (various strands) UK-focused, relevant mainly if you have a UK/NI operating presence.
Various pitch competitions (Women in Business NI, Belfast Telegraph Awards, IOD Pitch Perfect, EIT accelerators) Smaller cash prizes (£1,000–£20,000), highly competitive, often better for network and press than guaranteed funding. Apply broadly if you have capacity; don't build a funding plan around any single one.

What we'd actually recommend, in order

If you're a product founder in Ireland starting from scratch, this is the realistic sequence based on what worked for us:

  1. Start with your Local Enterprise Office. Free, low-friction, and the feasibility grant is genuinely designed for exactly the "I have an idea, not yet a business" stage.
  2. Apply to New Frontiers as early as you're eligible. It's the best value on this entire list — non-dilutive funding plus a genuine support structure, not just cash.
  3. Enter every relevant pitch competition and award, even small ones. Most won't pay out. The ones that do compound into credibility that makes the next ask easier — this is the "small wins" principle from the book in practice.
  4. Treat Enterprise Ireland's Pre-Seed Start Fund as a milestone, not a first step. It's for businesses with more traction than day-one founders typically have.
  5. Track everything. We built a simple spreadsheet of every programme applied, progressed, won, and lost — it's the single most useful thing we did operationally, because grant deadlines and eligibility windows move fast.

Funding and investor-readiness tools worth knowing about

A few tools we used alongside grant applications, for building investor lists and getting outside eyes on pitch materials:

Want the full playbook?

This list covers the grants. It doesn't cover the mindset, the pitching, the failures, or what to do when a "sure thing" grant falls through anyway — all of which shaped how GoPlugable actually got funded. That's in the book.

Get How to Start a Business with Almost No Money →

And if you're specifically bootstrapping in Ireland with limited capital rather than chasing grants for a scaling product company, the companion guide covers that ground: How to Start a Small Business in Ireland with (Almost) No Money →