Two open calls: become an ARIA Programme Director, or build a company with 5050

ARIA needs new Programme Directors with a biodiversity, ecology, or evolution focus

ARIA is now recruiting new Programme Directors. These are the people who shape the scientific direction of the agency: each PD conceives, designs, and actively manages a programme of roughly £50m, built around their own conviction about where a breakthrough is possible. Our efforts with Engineering Ecosystem Resilience, our seed projects, and our Accelerated Adaptation programme exist because that conviction was given room to run.

I'll be direct about why this matters to me. I am hopeful that there will be more ecological, biodiversity, and evolutionary work at ARIA past my tenure. But that depends entirely on new, ambitious PDs bringing those interests and sensitivities with them. Programmes don't emerge from committees; they emerge from individuals. If nobody from our fields steps forward, the ideas our fields most need funded simply won't be on the table.

So if you have ever looked at the gap between what ecology, conservation, or evolutionary biology could achieve and what it is resourced to attempt, and felt that someone should do something about it, this is the mechanism for being that someone. There is no one way to be an ARIA PD: current Programme Directors come from academia, entrepreneurship, invention, and industry.

Some ways to start thinking about a potential programme:

• If you had a magic wand, which global problem would you solve?
• Imagine the world 50 or 100 years from now. What do we have then that we lack today? What needs to happen to get there? Could £50m get us there faster, or test the riskiest element, so that once it is derisked, other sources of capital and funding can follow?
• What are the biggest challenges our world faces, and what scientific or technological breakthrough could pragmatically address them?
• What should we be investing in that no government, investor, or research council panel can yet agree is worth doing, but that would improve billions of lives if it worked?

Applications for the next cohort close on 28 September, for a May 2027 start. Over the coming months ARIA is running webinars and in-person events across the UK, Europe, the US, and Asia where you can meet the team and ask questions. Details and applications: aria.org.uk/programme-directors.

5050: from researcher to founder. Applications close 23 August

Run in partnership with ARIA, 5050 UK is a free, 14-week, part-time company-creation programme for people ready to tackle civilisation-scale problems and grow into exceptional founders. Since launching in March 2025, its alumni have closed £14m in funding, and 96% of founders who seek funding successfully close their seed round.

5050 is built for researchers: it combines actionable workshops, three weekend intensives, and hands-on mentorship to move you from idea to company. You'll learn from deep tech founders turned VCs who have supported 135 ventures that raised $4.5bn, and join a community of 450+ alumni who have founded over 100 companies across the UK and US. You'll learn three things: how to become a great founder; how to choose the right problem, technology, and market; and how to build an impactful deep tech company.

The practicalities:

• Weekly sessions and office hours run in the evening (18:00–20:30), in person in London and online; travel and accommodation are covered if needed.
• You'll have access to the Soho deep tech hub for coworking and meetings (fully stocked fridge included).
• The next cohort runs from 19 September to 18 December 2026.
• Individuals and teams are both welcome, from loose ideas to early ventures (pre-venture-capital raise).

Applications close on 23 August, with rolling applications after that while spaces remain. Full information and applications: fiftyyears.com/5050. Please feel free to share this broadly.