Enhancing synergies between the EIC and Startup Europe

For more details about expected outcome and impact, see the EIC Work Programme 2021 (action VI.11)

For more information on general conditions for applications, please see Annex 2 of the EIC Work Programme 2021.

 

Admissibility

Applications must be submitted before the call deadline.

Applications must be submitted electronically directly via the Funding & Tender Opportunities portal Electronic Submission System (accessible via the call topic page in the Search Funding & Tenders section); or indirectly via the EIC Platform where applicants will be redirected to the Portal. Paper submissions are NOT possible.

Applications must be readable, accessible, printable and complete (contain all the requested information and all required annexes and supporting documents) and must be submitted using the forms provided inside the Electronic Submission System.

The Application Form for Pathfinder and Transition will have two parts:

ª Part A (to be filled in directly online) — contains administrative information about the applicant organisations (future coordinator and beneficiaries and affiliated entities), the summarised budget for the proposal and call specific questions;

ª Part B (to be downloaded from the Portal Submission System, completed and then assembled and re-uploaded as PDF in the system) — contains the technical description of the project.

Annexes and supporting documents will be directly available in the Submission System and must be uploaded as PDF files (or other formats allowed by the system). 

The page limits and sections subject to limits will be clearly shown in the application templates and must be respected. Excess pages will be automatically made invisible, and will not be taken into consideration by the evaluators.

In no circumstances shall the same costs be financed twice by the budget (article 191 of the Financial Regulation). Applicants will be asked at a later stage for further documents (for legal entity validation, financial capacity check, bank account validation, etc). 

 

Eligibility

In order to be eligible for funding, the applicants must be established in one of the eligible countries:

• Member States (including overseas countries and territories or OCTs)
• Eligible non-EU countries, including Associated Countries 

Eligible entities: Startup ecosystem builders, business angel organisations, venture capital entities, accelerators, incubators, startup associations

Applications for Coordination and Support actions may be submitted by one or more legal entities, which may be established in a Member State, Associated Country, or in exceptional cases and if provided for in the specific call conditions, in another third country.

Concerning eligible associated countries and third countries, please see Annex 3 of the 2021 EIC Work Programme.

Financial capacity

The financial capacity check will be done on the basis of the documents you will be requested to upload in the Participant Register during grant preparation (e.g. profit and loss account and balance sheet, business plan, audit report produced by an approved external auditor, certifying the accounts for the last closed financial year, etc.). The analysis will be based on neutral financial indicators, but will also take into account other aspects, such as dependency on EU funding and deficit and revenue in previous years.

The check will normally only be done for the coordinator and if the requested grant amount is more than EUR 500 000, except for:

• public bodies (entities established as public body under national law, including local, regional or national authorities) or international organisations, and
• cases where the individual requested grant amount is not more than EUR 60 000 (low-value grant).

For more information, see Rules on Legal Entity Validation, LEAR Appointment and Financial Capacity Assessment.

 

Operational capacity

This assessment of operational capacity will be carried out during the evaluation of the award criterion ‘quality and efficiency of the implementation’, on the basis of the competence and experience of the applicants and their project teams, including its operational resources (human, technical and other) or, exceptionally, the measures proposed to obtain it by the time of the implementation of the tasks.

If the evaluation of this award criterion leads a score above the applicable threshold, then the applicants are considered to have sufficient operational capacity.

Public bodies, Member State organisations and international organisations are exempted from the operational capacity check.

 

Exclusion

Applicants that are subject to EU administrative sanctions (i.e. exclusion) or are in one of the following exclusion situations banning them from receiving EU grants can NOT participate:

• bankruptcy, winding up, affairs administered by the courts, arrangement with creditors, suspended business activities or other similar procedures (including procedures for persons with unlimited liability for the applicant’s debts),
• they are in breach of social security or tax obligations (including if done by persons with unlimited liability for the applicant’s debts),
• they are guilty of grave professional misconduct (including if done by persons having powers of representation, decision-making or control, beneficial owners or persons who are essential for the award/implementation of the grant),
• they are guilty of fraud, corruption, having links to a criminal organisation, money laundering, terrorism-related crimes (including terrorism financing), child labour or human trafficking (including if done by persons having powers of representation, decision-making or control, beneficial owners or persons who are essential for the award/implementation of the grant),
• they have shown significant deficiencies in complying with main obligations under an EU procurement contract, grant agreement or grant decision (including if done by persons having powers of representation, decision making or control, beneficial owners or persons who are essential for the award/implementation of the grant),
• they are guilty of irregularities within the meaning of Article 1(2) of Regulation No 2988/95 (including if done by persons having powers of representation, decision making or control, beneficial owners or persons who are essential for the award/implementation of the grant), or
• they have created under a different jurisdiction an entity with the intent to circumvent fiscal, social or other legal obligations in the country of origin or created another entity with this purpose (including if done by persons having powers of representation, decision making or control, beneficial owners or persons who are essential for the award/implementation of the grant).

Applicants will also be refused if it turns out that:

• during the award procedure they misrepresented information required as a condition for participating or failed to supply that information, or
• they were previously involved in the preparation of the call and this entails a distortion of competition that cannot be remedied otherwise (conflict of interest).

 For more information on the rules for exclusion, please see Articles 136 ans 141 of the EU Financial Regulation 2018/1046.

 

Evaluation and award

If admissible and eligible, the proposals for Coordination and Support Actions will be evaluated and ranked against the following award criteria:

Excellence	Impact	Quality and efficiency of the implementation
Clarity and pertinence of the project’s objectives.   Quality of the proposed coordination and/or support measures including soundness of methodology.	Credibility of the pathways to achieve the expected outcomes and impacts specified in the work programme, and the likely scale and significance of the contributions due to the project.   Suitability and quality of the measures to maximise expected outcomes and impacts, as set out in the dissemination and exploitation plan, including communication activities.	Quality and effectiveness of the work plan, assessment of risks, and appropriateness of the effort assigned to work packages, and the resources overall.    Capacity and role of each participant, and extent to which the consortium as a whole brings together the necessary expertise.

 

 

Evaluation scores will be awarded for the criteria, and not for the different aspects listed in the tables. For full applications, each criterion will be scored out of 5. The threshold for individual criteria will be 3. The overall threshold, applying to the sum of the three individual scores, will be 10.

 

 Indicative budget: EUR 6 million for 3-4 Coordination and Support Actions with a duration of 2 years (2022-2023).

The action will include financial support to third parties to allow startups to benefit from the services, as described in the EIC Work Programme. The monitoring of the support to third parties provided for each action, as well as the management of the financial support to third parties, will be ensured by the coordinator. The applicants must put in place proper communication and publicity of the actions engaged. The applicants must put in place a system that allows the proper monitoring of the benefit gained by the third parties as consequence of the actions described in the work programme and, ultimately, the proper reporting of the impact obtained. 

Applicants must allocate at least 75% of the total proposed budget to financial support to third parties.

 

Call document and annexes:
EIC Work Programme 2021
MGA used for EIC actions under Horizon Europe (HE General MGA)

 

Additional documents:

NEW: Guidance document for applicants

Horizon Europe Main Work Programme 2021-2022 - 13. General Annexes

EU Financial Regulation 2018/1046
Rules for Legal Entity Validation, LEAR Appointment and Financial Capacity Assessment
Funding & Tenders Portal Online Manual
Funding & Tenders Portal Terms & Conditions
Funding & Tenders Portal Privacy Statement

 

 

Additional links:

https://eic.ec.europa.eu/index_en

https://community-smei.easme-web.eu/ 

https://startupeuropeclub.eu/ 

https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/startup-europe

 

Online Manual is your guide on the procedures from proposal submission to managing your grant.

Horizon Europe Programme Guide contains the detailed guidance to the structure, budget and political priorities of Horizon Europe.

Funding & Tenders Portal FAQ – find the answers to most frequently asked questions on submission of proposals, evaluation and grant management.

Research Enquiry Service – ask questions about any aspect of European research in general and the EU Research Framework Programmes in particular.

Enterprise Europe Network – contact your EEN national contact for advice to businesses with special focus on SMEs. The support includes guidance on the EU research funding.

IT Helpdesk – contact the Funding & Tenders Portal IT helpdesk for questions such as forgotten passwords, access rights and roles, technical aspects of submission of proposals, etc.

European IPR Helpdesk assists you on intellectual property issues.

CEN and CENELEC, the European Standards Organisations advise you how to tackle standardisation in your project proposal. Contact CEN-CENELEC Research Helpdesk at [email protected].

The European Charter for Researchers and the Code of Conduct for their recruitment – consult the general principles and requirements specifying the roles, responsibilities and entitlements of researchers, employers and funders of researchers.

 

Partner Search Services help you find a partner organisation for your proposal.