Nominate Now: WILDLABS Awards 2025

With the support of Arm, the WILDLABS Awards support the advancement of conservation technology with $350,000 distributed across up to 15 projects. Building on the 2024 experience, they have refined the format of this year’s awards. In 2025, there will be two grant levels instead of three, with an additional grant available.

Focus Areas

• Here are examples of the types of conservation challenges projects could be working on:
  • Biodiversity and/or environmental monitoring
  • Captive breeding
  • Citizen science
  • Climate change/resilience
  • Habitat loss or destruction – (e.g deforestation)
  • Endangered species & ecosystems
  • Illegal or unsustainable fishing (iuu)
  • Human-wildlife conflict and coexistence
  • Invasive species
  • Pollution
  • Protected area management and planning
  • Scientific research
  • Species protection
  • Wildlife crime, illegal wildlife trade, or poaching
  • And much more!

Award Information

• They are distributing two tiers of grants to up to 15 projects with one year of funding to advance their conservation technology work:
  • $50,000 grants for five projects
  • $10,000 grants for ten projects

Eligible Projects

• There are three main types of projects that the WILDLABS Awards support:
  • Fostering Innovation (primarily for technology projects): They aim to support innovation projects grounded in solving real conservation needs. They expect these projects to test and pilot technology solutions with end-user needs that have already been identified.
  • Technology Adoption and Application (primarily for conservation projects): They aim to support conservation projects that integrate technology to broaden the reach and impact of their initiatives. They expect these projects to be led by conservation practitioners and researchers and may also involve collaborations with tech providers to improve/adapt existing tools to conservation situations. They hope the findings support the adoption of technology for other conservation projects.
  • Usability & Scaling (for conservation and technology projects): They aim to support projects that make technology more accessible and available. This means improving usability and bridging the gap between R&D projects and available technologies for conservationists to use in their work. They will also support work that transforms project ideas into products, helps scale manufacturing, and deploys already piloted technologies.

Eligibility Criteria

• To be eligible for participation, however, you must meet the following requirements:
  • Individuals must be at least eighteen (18) years of age and the age of majority in their jurisdiction of primary residence at the time of submission. Proof of residency and age may be required.
  • Applicant must not be involved in the reviewing process. Either in the short-listing stage or final selection. Applicants may include employees of Sponsor, but must not include any individual involved in any stage of the reviewing or selection process.

Judging Criteria

• Projects will be assessed based on how well they meet the following criteria:
  • Application Quality
  • Team Capacity
  • Contribution to the Conservation Technology Sector
  • Perceived Feasibility
  • WILDLABS Integration

Application Requirements

• When planning your budget, please ensure to allocate funds for the production of a video highlighting your project’s process and impact.
• Award funds will not support budget allocation towards fees for higher education.
• As these are one-year projects, they will not cover publication fees due to insufficient time to move through the peer-reviewed publication process.

For more information, visit WILDLABS.