Funding with no company needed
A checked list of funding you can take as an individual for AI and tech builders, with the eligibility gates spelled out: what it costs you, who can apply, and from where.
113 programmes
Sector-agnostic pre-seed cohort of two to three founders building breakthrough technology, investing up to $1M as equity or a convertible note over three months.
12 months in the Paris studio with an idea, a co-founder and a squad found for you, funded with 700,000 euros for 33.33% at incorporation. Roughly 12 founders a year get in.
Three-month in-person batch in San Francisco; YC invests $500,000 in two safes, $125,000 of it for a fixed 7%.
A free eight-week residency in San Francisco for non-US founders at the pre-idea or pre-team stage; selected teams receive $125,000 for 8% plus an optional $125,000 MFN SAFE.
$250,000 on a no-cap no-discount MFN SAFE for AI-native product startups, plus $600,000 in Azure and partner credits.
INR 360,000 Talent Investment stipend during team formation, then $125,000 on a post-money SAFE for 8%; 24 weeks split between Bangalore and San Francisco.
£6,000 Talent Investment stipend during team formation, then $125,000 on a post-money SAFE for 8%; 24 weeks split between London and San Francisco.
Three-month online programme to find a co-founder and build an MVP, paid for by the participant (EUR 1,000+VAT); top teams can pitch for a convertible investment up to EUR 100,000.
A three-month San Francisco residency with a $10,000 equity-free grant, housing and workspace for individuals exploring what to build; fellows can later pitch for up to $250,000 in investment.
Up to $5,000 in Lambda cloud credits for qualifying AI researchers to run work on Lambda Instances, with select research featured on Lambda's site.
$1,000 a month per chapter, no strings attached and no ownership claimed, open to individuals, groups and organizations through a single shared application form.
$100 to $1,000 for a solo builder's bill of materials, open to anyone of any age anywhere in the world, roughly ten days from application to funded.
Up to 18 months funded to form a science company in agriculture, climate, computation or pharma, working on opportunity areas DSV has already scoped. No stipend or equity figure is published.
Co-found a company from scratch with Founders Factory: pre-seed capital, a dedicated build team and access to its corporate partners. No amount or equity figure is published.
Start a company as CEO alongside the PSL studio team in Seattle, paid from day one, through validation to a funded spinout. No salary or equity figure is published.
Co-found a B2B SaaS company with the High Alpha studio: initial funding plus product, brand and go-to-market work, in exchange for equity. No amount or percentage is published.
Co-found a company with Atomic on a salary, equity and benefits package, backed by its $320M fund. Applications are open to individuals with or without an idea, and 10 to 15 founders are taken a year.
Free 30-day residential deep-tech residency in Bengaluru for 14 builders. Housing, meals, workspace, a hardware lab, over $30,000 in AI and cloud credits per person and a need-based ₹20,000 stipend. No fee and no equity.
Free compute on fal for researchers and developers working on open source AI projects. No published amount, no application form: you email grants@fal.ai with the project.
Cash grants, compute credits and follow-on support for existing Forge builders with a specific immediate use. No award amount is published and Forge takes no equity.
Free 22-day residency in Mandrem, Goa for 12 to 14 technical founders, with housing, meals, mentors, compute support and Demo Day covered. Applications close September 15, 2026.
Non-dilutive grants for open source maintainers, researchers and public-goods builders working on open AGI, with rolling applications and no fixed deadline.
A 15-day online AI build sprint for 50 individuals, with Codex workshops, AWS compute credits, Dodo payment credits, office hours and an in-person Demo Day in Bengaluru.
A stipend covering living expenses for 6 to 12 months so an open source maintainer can work full time on their project; no equity, no company required, work from anywhere.
Fast retroactive grants of 1-5 ETH for projects already live on Base; the Base team finds recipients through its own discovery process and community nominations rather than an application form.
A weekly 2 ETH pool distributed to active Base builders based on what they actually shipped that week, with no proposal and no minimum project size.
Rolling milestone-based grants for public goods on Solana; no grant size is published, and applications are reviewed continuously.
$500,000 to $5 million as the first check for technical enterprise founders, often before incorporation, product or a pitch deck.
Twelve-week in-person accelerator investing $500,000 to $2 million in about 20 pre-seed companies, plus more than $1 million in available cloud credits.
$500,000 to $2 million or more for software companies raising their first institutional round, open worldwide from idea stage onward.
Three-month hybrid pre-seed programme for Indian and Indian-origin AI founders, investing up to $1M-$2M as equity or a convertible note alongside Google's AI Futures Fund, plus up to $350,000 in Google compute credits.
$500,000 to $1.5 million at pre-seed or seed for companies powered by visual technology, computer vision and AI in North America, Europe and Israel.
Twelve weeks in person in San Francisco; $500K for 10% upfront on a SAFE plus a further $500K committed to the next round within 18 months.
$250,000 to $500,000 in pre-seed and seed rounds of at least $500,000, primarily for North American companies still finding product-market fit.
$400K upfront for 7% on a standard SAFE plus $600K guaranteed in the next external round; eight-week in-person bootcamp then open-ended residency.
A 12-week in-person London accelerator for eight teams building the Machine Economy; $300,000 per team for equity plus a future token allocation, with up to $1M in follow-on.
Up to $250,000 for 4% to 7% equity, plus a desk and builder support at the Founders, Inc. campus in San Francisco.
$250K on an uncapped, no-discount MFN SAFE plus a large compute credits package; Conviction publishes no equity percentage, so the stake is unknown.
$200,000 on a post-money SAFE for roughly 6%, with no program fee. A three-month on-site accelerator for 20 to 25 pre-seed and seed companies across San Francisco, New York and London. Applications close 4 October 2026.
$50,000 for frontier-technology founders who are too early to raise a full pre-seed round.
A five-week, full-time residency in Bristol for 16 early-stage founders, with a $10,000 scholarship and housing included. Applications close September 20, 2026.
12 months on Cartesia's Scale tier, worth over $8,000: 8M Sonic and Ink credits a month plus $300 a month in agent credits. Open to any stage.
Equity investments starting at $100,000 for AI startups from pre-seed through Series A, plus Anthropic credits and direct access to the Menlo and Anthropic teams.
Rolling milestone-based convertible grants for public goods that have a commercial component; no amount or conversion terms are published.
Pays open source maintainers, community managers and technical writers directly as freelance contractors for 3 to 12 months at 6 to 32 hours a week; hourly rate negotiated, not published.
Six months inside the SPC community to ideate and validate, with no cost and no equity taken; rolling admission.
Seed equity investment of $500K to $5M per company, with an eight-week immersion once a year and open-ended platform support; no equity percentage published.
$500,000 to $2 million, typically targeting about 10% ownership, for idea-stage through seed companies in healthcare, financial services and industrials.
First cheque of $350K to $1.25M at pre-seed on Seedsummit standard terms; Seedcamp publishes no fixed equity percentage.
$500,000 to $1 million at pre-seed or seed, with a published six-day process from video pitch to final decision.