Malta Business presents the EIC Accelerator call, launched by the European Union to support individual small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), including start-ups and spinouts, to develop and grow game-changing, i.e. ‘revolutionary’ innovations compared to what is currently on the market.
The call also supports, in some cases, small mid-caps (up to 500 employees), as well as encouraging, in particular, applications from start-ups and SMEs with women in senior roles within them.
The EIC Accelerator provides financial support through
– grant funding of up to €2.5 million for innovation development costs,
– investments of up to EUR 15 million managed by the EIC Fund for the scale-up of the innovation.
In addition, companies selected by the EIC will receive coaching, mentoring, access to investors and corporates, and many other opportunities by joining the EIC community.
As with all the European Commission’s EIC instruments, the EIC Accelerator includes an open and flexible call for proposals, which does not define a priori thematic priorities in which to submit project proposals (‘Open Funding’), and a call with a challenge-driven approach (‘EIC Strategic Challenges’), which will instead fund projects in specific technological areas predefined by the European Commission.
In particular:
– EIC Accelerator Open funds breakthrough innovations in any field of technology and application.
– EIC Accelerator Challenge funds breakthrough innovations in the following areas
Strategic Digital and Health technologies, Green Deal innovations for the economic recovery, supporting innovations in line with the Green Deal objectives (in particular, limiting emissions by 2030 and achieving climate neutrality by 2050).
A total of EUR 592.5 million is available in 2021 for the open call, and a further EUR 494.76 million for challenge-driven calls.
The cut-offs for 2021 (for both Accelerator Open and Accelerator challenges) are:
9 June 2021
6 October 2021
Malta Business Agency offers a targeted support service for accessing European funds from the EIC Accelerator call. To request more information or advice please fill in the following form.
