Australian entrepreneur and filmmaker David Raynor has launched Funding Atlas, a platform listing more than 27,000 verified funding opportunities across 196 countries.
Aimed at startups and small businesses, the service brings grants, investors, accelerators and other sources of finance into a single database. Raynor said it updates every two hours as programmes open and close, deadlines shift, and new opportunities appear.
The platform separates browsing from targeted search. Its Discover section lets users explore opportunities by country and funding category, while Search is designed for those with a specific business, sector, location or funding need in mind.
Categories include startups, small business, artificial intelligence, angel investors, private grants and crowdfunding. Users can also save opportunities and send lists to their inbox to review later on another device.
Notifications are intended to flag new opportunities relevant to a user's interests, reducing the need for repeated manual searches.
Raynor said the idea grew from his own experience searching for finance across careers in film, business and startups.
"I've been a filmmaker, a business owner and a founder, and I've experienced how difficult finding the right funding can be. You can spend hours searching government sites, investor networks and funding databases and still wonder what you've missed. Funding Atlas was created to make that search much simpler," said David Raynor, Founder, Funding Atlas.
The service draws together funding options from government programmes, foundations, universities, corporations, industry organisations, accelerators and investment groups. That range reflects different user needs, from early-stage founders seeking an accelerator to established businesses looking for expansion finance or technology companies seeking investment.
Search tools
Funding Atlas includes AI-assisted search to help users interpret what they are looking for and narrow results. Raynor said the distinction between discovery and search was intentional: some founders know exactly what support they need, while others are still exploring what might be available.
Once users identify a relevant opportunity, the platform directs them to application information from the organisation providing the funding. It acts as a discovery and filtering tool rather than a direct funding provider.
Its international scope reflects a market in which founders increasingly look beyond their home country for support. Some programmes have regional or international eligibility, making broader searches more relevant for businesses seeking capital.
Raynor said artificial intelligence is well suited to the volume of funding information and the speed at which it changes.
"Technology is changing incredibly quickly, particularly with AI. I see enormous opportunities to use it to solve real problems and make complicated processes much simpler," he said.
For smaller businesses and first-time founders, finding grants and investors can be especially difficult because they often lack access to grant writers, advisers or established investor networks. Funding Atlas is positioned as a starting point for those users, with tools to discover, monitor and revisit opportunities.
The launch marks Raynor's latest technology venture. He is also the founder of Morphosys, a filmmaking technology platform in development that will use AI tools to assist filmmakers during creative and production work.
His work across filmmaking, the creative industries, business ownership and technology has shaped the approach behind the new platform. Raynor described the project as an attempt to reduce friction in a process that often sends founders across multiple websites, directories and organisations.
"The real value for me is using technology to make something that was difficult yesterday much easier today," he said.