The EIC Accelerator funding (grant and equity, with blended financing option) by the European Commission (EC) and European Innovation Council (EIC) awards up to €2.5 million in grant and €10 million in equity financing per project (€12.5 million total) and is designed for startups and Small- and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SME), often supported by professional writers, freelancers or consultants.

This article is part of a series that contains suggestions for the EIC and the EIC Board regarding various improvements to the evaluation process (see ChatEIC).

Block Divestments

The EIC provides funding to support European DeepTech, but the attractiveness of foreign investments, especially in later funding rounds, and the dominance of US markets remain a long-term issue in some cases. While the EIC cannot control what companies will end up doing since they have the right to do what is best for them, it can exert leverage through the grant.

Here are simple suggestions that can send a clear signal for what the EIC wants to accomplish, and these could be included in the Grant Agreement Contract:

Blocking Acquisitions

If a grant recipient is acquired by a non-EU (or non-associated country) entity within 10 years of receiving the grant, then the grant converts to a loan and must be paid back with interest.

Why? This change is effectively blocking the loss of EU DeepTech to other territories.

Considerations: VCs like exits, and this addition might deter them from co-investing with the EIC Fund or recommending the EIC grant entirely. Currently, companies are often pushed by VCs to apply for the EIC grant, so this might have an impact. While this is a potential downside, the EIC does absolutely not want buyouts to the US or China, so this might be the right strategy regardless of the potential side effects.

From a VC’s perspective, this change would not necessarily close any exit windows since there are still many other ways to exit than through a US buyout (i.e., local buyout, IPO, secondaries). Additionally, if the valuations reach €1 billion, the small €2.5 million grant payback would be irrelevant to the foreign buyer since it would be below contractual fees for the acquisition process.

As a result, this rule could be very safe to integrate as a signal for what the EIC wants, and it can deter early-stage companies from divesting their IP instead of building in Europe. If a foreign acquisition is made regardless, the rule also returns the grant funding to the EIC, which means that it will never be a loss to the EIC or the EU DeepTech sector.

Other integrations: Mergers, SPACs, divesting IP, transferring technical and founding team, holding companies, etc.

Foreign Subsidiaries

If a grant recipient creates a (new) US or Chinese subsidiary within 2 years after the grant project has been completed, then the grant converts to a loan and must be paid back with interest.

Why? While the North American or Asian markets are important targets for all EIC Accelerator winners, the EIC would often prefer to see them be secondary markets after Europe. This is not always realistic since customers and revenues are often more available in the US, but the EIC could still try to send a signal that the companies should start with Europe before they scale in the US. Grant proposals also assess that aspect so including a formal rule makes sense.

Why this rule is risk-free: EIC Accelerator winners can still sell in these markets, can operate existing subsidiaries in the US or China, and can onboard distributors in these countries. The rule acts as a signal that an EIC Accelerator winner should not set up shop in another country right after completing the project for at least 2 years. Afterward, they are free to create subsidiaries in any country they like.

Why These Rules?

The EIC uses the equity investment as a leverage device (i.e., board seats, blocking divestments), but it neglects the leverage it has through the grants. No company wants “free money” to turn into a loan, so this is an underutilized leverage point that the EIC could easily integrate.

Funding Decisions

The EIC Jury might categorize interviewees into 4 general buckets:

Interviewees who are rejected with clear red flags
Interviewees who are rejected with many flaws
Interviewees who are rejected with few flaws
Interviewees who are approved

Without understanding the full process of the selection, the suggestions will be brief:

Categories 1 and 4 are clear since these are definite rejections or approvals, respectively. Categories 2 and 3 are different since they have the vague stigma of flaws attached to them, which are quite subjective. Subjectivity is unavoidable in the EIC Jury since that is a feature rather than a bug (i.e., diverse backgrounds, different fields of expertise, etc.), but there should be a way to score the flaws against each other to create a fair ranking.

A way of accomplishing that could be to quantify the number of flaws and discuss their quality, since Jury members might weigh flaws differently.

Based on experience, every EIC Accelerator winner has flaws. If the Jury decides to fund them, then it just means that they found their flaws acceptable rather than deal breakers. But Jury members will find a certain flaw (i.e., inexperienced team) acceptable for one company but unacceptable for another, so there should be a way of reconciling that across all assessed companies.

The general problem is that the same flaw can be a problem for one company while it is not a problem for another. An inexperienced CEO with a confident and knowledgeable cadence will be perceived positively, while an inexperienced CEO who stutters himself into a dead end will not.

If the budget still allows for companies in categories 2 and 3 to be funded, then the Jury members can provide the reasons why companies should be funded and quantify the flaws that are real negatives, along with a weighting factor (i.e., 1, 2, 3).

Total Flaws	4
Weight 1	2*1
Weight 2	1*2
Weight 3	1*3
Total Score	7

This method is not perfect, but it aims to translate the subjective conviction of the individual Jury members into a quantified score that can be ranked in a fair manner.

Importantly, there should be no quota per panel where each panel has a minimum number of funding decisions to give. The final decision should be centralized at the end since it is about finding the best companies to be fair to the applicants and not to be fair to the Jury (i.e., by not making them only reject companies which can happen).

Post Interview

Seal of Excellence (SoE)

This SoE certificate has been handed out for many years, and its meaning has changed over time. An SoE obtained in 2018 might not be of the same quality as an SoE obtained in 2025, but both are prominently displayed on company websites today.

Changing the SoE is not necessary, but it could be a good idea to attach an EIC Board recommendation to it. The SoE is supposed to be a signal for investors, but its meaning has changed too much, which renders it confusing at best.

An EIC Board recommendation, on the other hand, can be a single-page document, just like the SoE, that categorizes the company into a clear bucket with a timestamp attached to it.

One example of a category could be as follows: The EIC Board has thoroughly assessed this company and considers it to be highly attractive for private capital investments.

Resubmissions

Resubmitting a proposal 6 months after a rejection due to a small technicality is not ideal, as the effort of the initial evaluation will be lost, and the applicant must start from scratch. If the rejection was due to major red flags, then a resubmission is likewise unnecessary, especially if all Jury members feel that this company will never receive funding, no matter how hard it tries.

Red Flags

If the jury thinks that this company will never be funded (i.e., red flags), then the ESR should state a clear recommendation that honestly reflects this opinion:

“The applicant is free to resubmit their proposal, but the jury deems the chances of receiving funding to be very low. We advise the applicant to either apply with a different project or not to reapply.”

This recommendation should not be the default, of course, but it should be reserved for clear red flags that are just unfundable.

Rejection With Flaws

The jury should simply suggest a resubmission, but also indicate the nature of the flaws in a realistic manner. It should likewise justify why the applicant is sent back to the proposal stage, i.e.:

“The jury has identified critical flaws in the commercial and technical implementation of the project, which requires the applicant to revise the proposal before returning to the interview.”

Very Narrow Rejections

Narrow rejections are quite tricky since the budget will always be limited, and waiting for the next deadline might ruin the timing of the innovation. If there are only a small handful of applicants that are narrowly rejected (i.e., maybe just 2-6), but Jury members feel strongly about funding them, then there could be a second chance.

Maybe a remote follow-up interview of 30 minutes could be held on a single day, about 4 weeks after the interview, where applicants can report on the identified flaws and their mitigation.

This implementation does not fit too well into the current cut-off workflow of the EIC with a unified announcement, but having a Runners-Up announcement with a 6-week delay after the cut-off announcement could not be a bad marketing boost for the EIC in general, since it also generates publicity and gives more hope to applicants. It could be restricted to applicants with clear timing issues (i.e., waiting 6 months is too long), while the less urgent, narrow rejections will be invited directly to the next interview round.

This article was last modified on May 4, 2025 @ 09:35

These tips are not only useful for European startups, professional writers, consultants and Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SME) but are generally recommended when writing a business plan or investor documents.

Deadlines: Post-Horizon 2020, the EIC Accelerator accepts Step 1 submissions now while the deadlines for the full applications (Step 2) under Horizon Europe are:

Step 1
- Open now: Apply as soon as possible to be eligible for the next Step 2 submission deadline
  - Proposals are sent for evaluation on the first Tuesday of every month
Step 2 (closing 17:00 Brussels Time)
- 1^st cut-off 2025: -
- 2^nd cut-off 2025: March 12^th 2025
- 3^rd cut-off 2025: -
- 4^th cut-off 2025: October 1^st 2025
Step 3
- 1^st cut-off 2025: -
- 2^nd cut-off 2025: TBD
- 3^rd cut-off 2025: -
- 4^th cut-off 2025: TBD

The Step 1 applications must be submitted weeks in advance of Step 2. The next EIC Accelerator cut-off for Step 2 (full proposal) can be found here. After Brexit, UK companies can still apply to the EIC Accelerator under Horizon Europe albeit with non-dilutive grant applications only - thereby excluding equity-financing.

Contact: You can reach out to us via this contact form to work with a professional consultant.

AI Grant Writer: ChatEIC is a fully automated EIC Accelerator grant proposal writer: Get it here.

EU, UK & US Startups: Alternative financing options for EU, UK and US innovation startups are the EIC Pathfinder (combining Future and Emerging Technologies - FET Open & FET Proactive) with €4M per project, Thematic Priorities, European Innovation Partnerships (EIP), Innovate UK with £3M (for UK-companies only) as well as the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) grants with $1M (for US-companies only).

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by Stephan Segler, PhD
Professional Grant Consultant at Segler Consulting

General information on the EIC Accelerator template, professional grant writing and how to prepare a successful application can be found in the following articles:

A Quick FTO Guide for EIC Accelerator Applicants in a Rush

2023 Budget Allocations for EIC Pathfinder, Transition and Accelerator

Developing the Unique Selling Points (USP) for the EIC Accelerator

Explaining the Resubmission Process for the EIC Accelerator

A Short but Comprehensive Explanation of the EIC Accelerator

EIC Accelerator Success Cases

Deciding Between EIC Pathfinder, Transition and Accelerator

A Winning Candidate for the EIC Accelerator

EIC Accelerator Interview Preparation Process: Scripting the Pitch (Part 1)