Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA)

A Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA) is an agency's public notice of the availability of competitive grant or cooperative agreement funding, functionally equivalent to the Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO), and used particularly by NIH and DOE to announce research grant programs.

What is a Funding Opportunity Announcement?

An FOA is the formal document through which a federal agency announces that it has funds available for a specific competitive grant program and invites eligible organizations to submit applications. Like a NOFO, an FOA specifies the program purpose, eligibility requirements, funding level, application requirements, review criteria, and submission deadline.

NIH uses the term "Funding Opportunity Announcement" as its standard terminology for all grant and cooperative agreement opportunities posted in the NIH Guide for Grants and Contracts. NIH FOAs include several distinct types: Parent Announcements (broad, standing opportunities for standard research grants), Program Announcements (PAs, with targeted scientific priority areas), Requests for Applications (RFAs, which have set aside funds and specific deadlines), and SBIR/STTR solicitations. Understanding the FOA type is important because RFAs have fixed deadlines and specific review cycles, while PAs accept applications on a rolling basis.

DOE also prominently uses the FOA designation for its competitive grant and financial assistance programs under EERE (Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy), ARPA-E, and the Office of Science. DOE FOAs typically involve very large funding levels, often tens or hundreds of millions of dollars, and complex multi-organization consortium applications.

All FOAs, regardless of the agency term used, must be posted on Grants.gov, which is the authoritative source for finding federal financial assistance opportunities.

Why FOAs matter for government contractors

Technology companies pursuing DOE energy, NIH health, or NSF science funding rely on FOAs as the primary tool for identifying and tracking R&D funding opportunities. Because FOA terminology and structure vary by agency, contractors who work across multiple agencies should understand the specific conventions of each agency's announcement system.

Example

The Department of Energy's ARPA-E office publishes an FOA titled "OPEN 2025" on Grants.gov and the ARPA-E funding website, inviting applications for transformational energy research across all technology areas. The FOA specifies a $150 million total funding level, awards ranging from $500,000 to $5 million, and a single submission deadline 90 days after FOA publication. A clean energy startup reads the FOA, confirms its advanced battery storage technology fits within the scope, and submits a full application by the deadline.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is an FOA the same as a NOFO?

Yes, functionally. Both terms refer to the same type of document, an agency's public announcement of a competitive grant opportunity. The term NOFO is used in 2 CFR Part 200 as the standard term. Individual agencies (especially NIH and DOE) use "FOA" as their preferred terminology. Both documents serve the same legal and operational purpose.

Where do I find NIH FOAs?

NIH FOAs are published in the NIH Guide for Grants and Contracts at grants.nih.gov/funding/searchguide. They are also posted on Grants.gov. NIH offers email alerts that notify registered users of new FOAs matching specified criteria.

Can I respond to an FOA if I was not invited?

Yes. FOAs are public announcements open to all eligible applicants, they are not targeted to specific organizations. Any organization meeting the eligibility requirements stated in the FOA may submit an application.

What is the difference between an RFA and a PA in NIH terminology?

A Request for Applications (RFA) is an FOA with set-aside funds from a specific budget, a targeted scientific priority, and one or a small number of fixed application due dates. A Program Announcement (PA) is a standing opportunity that accepts applications on a rolling basis under the standard NIH review cycle, without a fixed pool of reserved funds.