- Do you have an innovative idea?
- Find partners
- Find a suitable call The European Commission advertises grant opportunities through calls for proposals, very similar with UKRI. The call for proposal includes all the guidance information needed to submit a proposal and therefore it should be read with extreme care. The call text defines:
- the requirements of the call: scope, targeted objectives, and outcomes
- the eligibility criteria
- the evaluation criteria
The project proposal needs to match very well the requirements of the call (Carefully read the key words used in the call).
To find a call browse the websites offering an overview of available national and European calls for proposals here: https://ec.europa.eu/info/funding-tenders/opportunities/portal/screen/home
Main points of a call for proposals and tips for reading it
- Requested activity and results: particularly specific challenge, scope, expected impacts.
- Grant amount for research proposals.
- Funding rate: many funding schemes require companies to contribute to the costs of the research proposals, and they can tie the release of funds to some milestones.
- Consortium criteria: there might be a minimum number of partners and a minimum number of countries allowed. Note that some non-EU countries such as UK, Norway, Israel, and Switzerland, can be eligible to participate in EU proposals. There may also be criteria related to company size.
- The Technology Readiness Level (TRL) may be requested. This means how advanced and validated your technology is to be able to deliver the research. The TRL levels required are usual different for SMEs and middle size and large companies.
- Duration: minimum and maximum duration, is specified in the call. There is also the possibility to apply for longer timeframes for some fields (for example health).
- The calls can be Single stage or two-stage proposal process.
- Deadlines: by when one need to fill forms/upload and submit documents.
4. Time – Do you have enough time to write your research grant proposal, think about an adequate buffer for partner discussions on tasks and budgets.
5. Find some more partners (where applicable)
6. Start the process by registering to EU Funding and Tenders Portal
7. Write your application: think Excellence, Impact, Implementation
8. Cost your application: Staff, travel, equipment, subcontracting, other direct costs
9. Convince the evaluators – the evaluators come from diverse backgrounds, they work under time pressure, so all important information needs to be easy to find, they evaluate the application based on a specific evaluation criteria and they give points usually from 0 to 5 or give a decision of GO / NO GO, sometimes they might find a grant application out of scope. They could sometimes interview the applicants.
10. Where to get help?
- One can find all guidelines for the call on the call pages:
- National contact point (one need to create an account) – https://www.ukro.ac.uk/about-ukro/; https://www.ukro.ac.uk/?s=national+contact+point
- The Faculty R&I BDM, RaIS
- Consulting agencies – https://www.eaic.eu/