€2.5M for Commercialisation of Research Based Innovations

You have an exciting innovation at TRL 4 and an identified application, but now what?

The European Innovation Council is offering grants of up to €2.5M through the EIC Transition that will allow you to reach TRL 6 and demonstrate the value of the technology in an application-relevant environment. The fund is open to projects based on results obtained through previous EIC Pathfinder or ERC PoC projects.?

The expected outcomes of your EIC Transition project are a) a technology that is demonstrated to be effective for its intended application and b) a business model, its initial validation and a business plan for its development to market.

The program offers two different types of calls: the?EIC Transition Open?is a?bottom-up?approach that allows applicants to submit a project pertaining to any type of domain, technology or research area. Then, the?EIC Transition Challenges?are?top-down?calls that invite applicants to respond to pre-defined challenges addressing specific technological breakthroughs.?In 2022:

• Green digital devices for the future (for which approximately half of the budget is reserved)
• Process and system integration of clean energy technologies
• RNA based therapies and diagnostics for complex or rare genetic disorders?

What are the elements of a winning proposal??

This is not a straightforward question to answer because many different factors could contribute to the success of a proposal, and these vary widely according to several factors including the type of project, field of research and relevant industry. Nonetheless, we believe that a few elements are crucial for success when submitting a proposal to the EIC Transition grant. Here they are:

• A project with?high novelty?and significant?impact, led by a?strong, multidisciplinary consortium. The ideal consortium composition would be (1) the technology developer (2) an end user or other industrial entity who can demonstrate the technology in the application-relevant environment and (3) a business champion who is willing and able to take the lead on the commercialisation to bring the innovation to market
• Market pre-validation?has been carried out showing good?acceptability?from potential?end users?and good?problem/solution fit.?End user needs are known and a network has already been initialised among potential customers
• Strong business potential?and a sound and sustainable commercialisation plan to be validated during the project. The technology development work planned for the project has been adapted to the commercial strategy, and not the other way round.
• A?well written and interesting proposal?that tells the?story?of the project, its impact and its intended route to market in a coherent and effective way, keeping the evaluator in mind at each step of the process.

What is the evaluator thinking?

Sometimes, a technically sound, high-novelty, high-impact project led by a strong multidisciplinary consortium and with potentially promising business potential, receives a good evaluation and perhaps even scores above threshold and reaches the interview phase but fails to receive funding. This tends to happen due to a common drawback – The coordinators of the project and the proposal writing are?not thinking like evaluators. In order to convince the evaluators to invest in your research, it is crucial to understand their perspective and address their demands. Often times, proposals are coordinated and written by academic researchers, who are used to presenting?research projects.?A research project comes across with significant risks for producing something that could have commercial value, or a very long time to market due to lack in business planning. In the EIC Transition, applicants should pivot away from rigid research thinking and show how the project supports generating revenues a few years down the line.

Want to apply? – We want to partner with you!

The 2022 cut-offs are coming up on the 4th?May and 28th?September, for both the EIC Transition Open and the EIC Transition Challenges. Should you require a business development partner, or any support with consortium building, proposal coordination and writing, interview preparation, or perhaps re-submission of an unsuccessful proposal, we invite you to get in touch. We know how, and are also starting with our own EIC Transition projects later in 2022.