Tag Archives: EIC Accelerator deadline

EIC Accelerator, Horizon Europe, SME Instrument / EIC Accelerator

Smack My Pitch Up: Changing The Evaluation Focus Of The EIC Accelerator

The EIC Accelerator funding (grant and equity, with blended financing option) has undergone substantial changes over the past years, especially during the transition from the Horizon 2020 (2014-2020) to the Horizon Europe (2021-2027) framework program.

As part of the European Commissions (EC) and European Innovation Councils (EIC) portfolio of funding instruments (see EIC Programs), it supports startups and Small- and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SME) with up to €2.5 million in grant and €15 million in equity financing per project (€17.5 million total).

Keeping Up With The EIC

In contrast to many other public grant opportunities for businesses, the EIC Accelerator remains in constant flux due to varying influencing factors such as increasing marketing by the EIC, conflicts between the European Parliament and Commission as well as changes in the proposal templates, evaluation process and budgets (see Work Programme 2023).

To advise prospective applicants accurately, it is often the responsibility of professional writers, freelancers or consultants to keep track of the newest changes, trends and potential disruptions that could occur in the EIC programs.

This can include changes in the proposal submission process, potential budget alterations, disruptions through AI (see ChatGPT) or subtle changes in the success rates of the program (see Success Cases).

The Eroding Evaluation Process

The EIC Accelerator follows a simple but lengthy 3-step evaluation process that uses a short application (Step 1), a long application (Step 2) and a remote interview (Step 3) as its base (see What is the EIC Accelerator?).

For the first two steps, the EIC uses thousands of remote evaluators to account for the high number of submitted applications while the last step uses a small number of commercially-oriented jury members. Ideally, this process allows the EIC to vet good technologies in the first two steps and then select the best business cases in the last stage to ensure that the long-term success of the program remains high.

Since the inception of the new EIC Accelerator in 2021, the evaluation process has remained the same but the outcomes of the process have changed dramatically.

The graphic shows the selection rates for the EIC Accelerator’s full proposal (Step 2, white), the interview (Step 3, green) and the combined rates for both stages (Step 2×3, yellow).

It is evident that, while the overall success rates (yellow) have trended slightly downwards, there has been a strong trend for the increase of Step 2 and a decrease of Step 3 selection rates.

This means that the EIC is starting to rely more and more on the EIC Jury in the interview rather than the remote evaluators to assess the quality of the projects.

It likewise means that the quality of the EIC Jury is naturally being eroded since more interviews require more interviewers with a venture background but these are harder to come by than the remote evaluators.

Jury Jeopardy

The goal of the EIC Accelerator interviews is to use a small number of highly qualified experts who make the final funding decisions which increases the quality and ideally reduces the randomness of the selection process.

But, by increasing the number of jury members, the entire process will likely become even more random.

Written Step 1 and Step 2 EIC Accelerator applications present a certain degree of control and predictability whereas applicants can rely on expert proposal writers to support them. For the interview, even the most elaborate pitch coaching will still present a significantly higher luck factor and is subject to the influence of interpersonal skills that are difficult to assess and train within just a few weeks.

Even the EIC’s report on the EIC Accelerator program has revealed that the interviews are presenting a high degree of randomness when it comes to rejections and approvals (see 2020 Report). This is aggravated by the fact that applicants cannot rebut the comments of the jury members outside of being invited to an interview.

What Happened?

In 2021, everything seemed perfect: The EIC Accelerator budget was at an all-time high, Horizon Europe had just launched, the EIC had completely reinvented the submission process and global financial markets were on the good side of the economic bubble when money was available and interest rates were low.

The first EIC Accelerator deadline in June was concluded with unprecedented funding rates that were incomparable to the less than 1% observed just a few months before:

Rates in % Step 2 Step 3 Step 2×3
June 2021 16 50 8
October 2021 19 47 9
March 2022 24 28 7
June 2022 24 32 8
October 2022 22 33 7
January 2023 33 20 7

Note: The January 2023 cut-off did not include the EIC Accelerator Strategic Challenges which might have impacted the selection rates.

16% of all Step 2 applicants were selected and a total of 50% were selected in the Step 3 interviews (see June 2021 Success). This means that one out of every two applicants was selected in the interview which is a very promising rate for interviewees.

Step 2 was still quite selective with a rate of only 16% but, over the following years, the selection rates for Step 2 gradually increased while the interview rates decreased.

Don’t Turn on the Light

There are a variety of potential explanations for this but the most obvious answer lies in the Step 2 evaluation process itself. Every company applying to the EIC Accelerator is able to see the comments and reasoning for the rejection of their proposal with great detail (see Developing the Rebuttal).

This means that the rejectee has a transparent view of what is needed to succeed in this step according to the first evaluators that have read the application. This is in contrast to the previous submission process where no comments were obtained and applicants that were rejected had to take a shot in the dark in their resubmission.

Today, a resubmission is much easier since the applicant only needs to address the evaluator’s criticisms in a logical manner to succeed while the new evaluators will likely not re-read the entire application and only rely on the conversation between the first evaluators and the applicant.

Innovation All the Way Down

But there is a second reason why this trend most likely occurred and it is directly related to the new system the EIC has created in its hunger for innovation. The previous system relied on numerical scorings to rank companies but the new system does not provide any possibility to rank the applicants.

Instead of handing out numerical scores from 1.00 to 15.00 per company, the EIC replaced this process with a binary grading (GO or NO GO). This has removed the resolution of the process since the EIC cannot introduce rankings and thresholds to account for the limited budgets.

If the current EIC Accelerator produces 500 companies for the interview but cannot differentiate between them then all companies have to attend the interview, thereby reducing the selection rates. In the previous EIC Accelerator, all projects selected for the interview could be ranked so it was possible to only allow the top 50 companies to attend the interview, thereby retaining a high selection rate.

Where Are We Going?

With the current process, there is a chance that success rates in the interview could drop into the single digits even if the EIC schedules longer interview weeks for Step 3. It is also jeopardizing the integrity of the interview sessions since the quality of jury members will be reduced by increasing their numbers and the randomness encountered in the interview can present long-term reputational damage to the EIC.

While there is no obvious solution to this problem, it is essential for the EIC to rank the applicants in some manner since it will otherwise erode the quality of the evaluation process in the long-term (see Application Process).

The best short-term approach would be to gather statistics on the rejection reasons in Step 3 and enforce them in Step 1 so that the number of applicants can be reduced early.

If teams are too small, their last funding round was too big, their industry is not attractive or other common rejection reasons are encountered then the EIC should disqualify them in Step 1 and not allow them to reach Step 3 just to be disappointed later on (see Who Should Not Apply).

The goal of the EIC should not be to market the EIC Accelerator broadly and have as many applicants as possible but to only attract the applicants that the Step 3 jury will be willing to fund. This should be reflected by the evaluation process whereas Step 1 should filter out companies based on the current criteria but also based on additional numerical criteria such as Full-Time Employees (FTE), current fund-raising, burn rate, customer traction, revenues and other simple parameters.

This article was last modified on May 11, 2023 @ 14:19

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 (short proposal)
    • open now
  • Step 2 (business plan)
    • 1st cut-off: -
    • 2nd cut-off: -
    • 3rd cut-off: -
    • 4th cut-off: October 19th 2023 (extended)
  • Step 3 (interview)
    • 1st cut-off: -
    • 2nd cut-off: -
    • 3rd cut-off: October 2nd to 6th (extended)
    • 4th cut-off: November 27th to December 8th

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.

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).

Any more questions? View the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) section.

Want to see all articles? They can be found here.

For Updates: Join this Newsletter!


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)

EIC Accelerator, Horizon Europe, SME Instrument / EIC Accelerator

How to Craft an EIC Accelerator Rebuttal: Explaining Grant Proposal Resubmissions

The EIC Accelerator by the European Commission (EC) and European Innovation Council (EIC) awards up to €2.5 million in grant and €15 million in equity financing per project (€17.5 million total).

Startups and Small- and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SME) often rely on consultants, professional writers or freelancers to support them in preparing impactful grant applications due to the many difficult aspects that have been introduced in 2021.

The Evaluation

The EIC Accelerator grant financing (with blended equity option) is a highly selective funding program and, due to the high degree of subjectivity combined with a pool of anonymous and remote evaluators, rejections are a very common occurrence (see Resubmissions).

Due to the difficulties that the EIC encounters in creating an efficient and affordable evaluation process, it is often a necessary evil to use evaluators who are not experts in a field or are too busy to read the entire application carefully.

As a result, each evaluation can contain criticisms that are wrong or simply reveal ignorance regarding core industry functions. This, of course, does not mean that evaluators are always wrong since there are many projects that do not fit the program and are rightfully rejected because of a lack of innovation, company traction or a poor business model.

This article focuses on projects that are a great fit for the EIC Accelerator but are, often unfairly, rejected by a close margin in Step 2 of the application process (see Evaluation Criteria).

It also focuses on the second step of the process since Step 1 is very easy to pass and any rejection in this stage is a clear sign that a company has little appeal to the EIC or has not prepared a diligent application.

The Rebuttal

The rebuttal is a special section of the proposal template that allows applicants to (1) respond to the evaluation of the previously rejected proposal and (2) explain what is different about the current application. This is an essential section since it will be prominently displayed on top of the proposal as it is viewed by the evaluators and the reviewers might focus their assessment largely on the rebuttal rather than reading the entire application as closely as the first reviewers did.

Evaluations can be frustrating since the reviewers can make critical mistakes in their evaluation by misquoting LOI’s, misreading FTO’s, claiming that data is missing even though it was present or simply making logical flaws in their arguments which are easily identified through critical thinking.

Yet, the EIC is generally declining any re-evaluations for applicants who complain of material mistakes made by the evaluators and just refers them to the rebuttal in the next application deadline. But of course, if a company has been rejected twice, it will have to wait another 12 months until they are able to re-apply.

Note: There are rare exceptions where the EIC will allow Step 2 proposals to be re-evaluated in case the evaluators made a critical mistake regarding the rules of the EIC but it is extremely rare and decided on a case-by-case basis.

Crafting the Rebuttal

1. Read the Evaluation Summary Report (ESR)

The first step in crafting an impactful rebuttal is to read the ESR carefully. Based on the score obtained in the evaluation, it will be evident if a rebuttal can make a positive impact or not since a narrow rejection will be more malleable while an overwhelming rejection will not be.

Step 2 of the EIC Accelerator provides 9 individual GO criteria which are distributed over 3 evaluators and 3 topic areas, namely:

  1. Excellence
  2. Scale-Up Potential
  3. Level of risk, implementation, and need for Union support

If an ESR signifies that an application has obtained 1 out of 9 possible GO criteria (i.e. 8 NO GO) then no rebuttal will be likely to convince future evaluators. In fact, the lower the number of GO gradings is, the more the main Step 2 proposal must be improved to compensate for the lacking presentation.

The higher the number of GO criteria is, the less the application needs to be adjusted and the more can be conveyed through a rebuttal.

There are a variety of tips regarding the improvement of the main proposal which can be found in the articles on this website (see Articles).

2. Extract the Criticism (and Sometimes Praise)

Every ESR will contain criticism. It is even a common occurrence that an evaluator provides a GO grading but still introduces critical points that place the project in a negative light. While it would be convenient to ignore such harmless criticisms, one must still address them in the rebuttal since these will raise doubts in the next evaluator’s minds.

It is important to go through the entire evaluation and carefully mark every single negative point. Less important but still useful is searching for positive remarks by the evaluators that have additional weight attached to them.

An example could be that an evaluator identifies themselves as part of the customer group, a scientific researcher in that field or suggests they have any other source of insider knowledge which gives credibility to their positive assessments.

Such statements should be highlighted in the rebuttal, if positive.

In the case of narrow rejections, it is very often one evaluator who continually criticizes the project while the remaining two evaluators remain positive. Nonetheless, all criticisms must be addressed irrespective of the GO or NO GO criteria.

3. Highlight the Good

A powerful start to any rebuttal is to first highlight the positive. This, of course, is generally reserved for projects that have been rejected narrowly with 7 or 8 out of 9 possible GO’s. The first sentence can then stress that the response was overwhelmingly positive with a few minor criticisms by a single evaluator who did not fully understand the project.

It should then be followed, if available, by positive remarks from an evaluator with insider knowledge. Highlight how an evaluator who has insider information immediately grasped the impact of the product while an evaluator who was unaware of the industry used, as an example, Google for a quick search which led to misinformed comments.

If an evaluator added a powerful quote, it should be added to the rebuttal since it can preempt the following evaluators with a perception of high quality.

4. Highlight the Ignorance

Since the thousands of EIC evaluators are subject to only minimal due diligence and their work is generally underpaid with an increasingly high workload, the evaluations are often not of the highest quality.

In general, the tone of the rebuttal should be professional and polite with an objective view of what was missing and the changes that have been made. It should also objectively clarify misunderstandings or criticisms that were encountered in the ESR.

Still, there is a place to highlight the ignorance of particular evaluators if they made obvious logical flaws. This can be in cases where an evaluator mentioned a competing product but misrepresents the product offering, misquotes a Letter of Intent (LOI), calculates a fictitious case study but makes a numerical error or simply presents an argument based on publicly available data which, after investigation, was incorrect.

In such cases, the rebuttal should use every chance to state that this evaluator was factually incorrect. It is beneficial to make clear and logical arguments why this evaluator was wrong.

The rebuttal should also point out whenever information that the evaluator claimed was missing was already part of the previous submission. This casts additional doubt on their critical comments.

It has the impact of (1) showing future evaluators that the previous negative assessment was wrong and (2) communicating to evaluators that they should think deeply before criticizing the project since they must be sure to not make logical errors.

Still, the rebuttal should be fair even to the critical evaluators so as to not antagonize future evaluators but, in all likelihood, the new evaluators will be on your side if the rebuttal uses logic to dismantle previous criticisms – even if it is harsh.

5. Add Minimal Changes

For close rejections where the number of critical points is limited and the score in Step 2 amounted to 7-8 out of 9 GO’s, it is sufficient to leave the majority of the proposal as is and simply make minor adjustments based on the feedback.

Such changes can be the introduction of new deliverables, milestones, patent information, visual data, case studies or any other points that were identified as lacking by the evaluators.

Often, it is sufficient to introduce very small additions since the new evaluators generally want to see that changes have been made rather than requiring the changes to be extensive.

In contrast, an application that has received a low score in the Step 2 evaluation will likely have to introduce substantial changes and often requires reshaping of key sections of the application such as the features & use cases, competitors, value chain, market and work plan.

This article was last modified on Apr 5, 2023 @ 16:40

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 (short proposal)
    • open now
  • Step 2 (business plan)
    • 1st cut-off: -
    • 2nd cut-off: -
    • 3rd cut-off: -
    • 4th cut-off: October 19th 2023 (extended)
  • Step 3 (interview)
    • 1st cut-off: -
    • 2nd cut-off: -
    • 3rd cut-off: October 2nd to 6th (extended)
    • 4th cut-off: November 27th to December 8th

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.

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).

Any more questions? View the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) section.

Want to see all articles? They can be found here.

For Updates: Join this Newsletter!


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)

EIC Accelerator, Horizon Europe, SME Instrument / EIC Accelerator

How long does it take to apply for the EIC Accelerator? (Grant proposal timeline)

The EIC Accelerator funding (grant and equity, with blended financing option) by the European Commission (EC) and European Innovation Council (EIC) is designed for startups and Small- and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SME). It provides €2.5 million in grant and €15 million in venture financing per project and is often supported by professional writers, freelancers or consultants (see Comprehensive Explanation).

This article presents a brief explanation of the timeline for the EIC Accelerator and aims to clarify how much time is needed to prepare all documents and go through the complete process.

Step 1: The Short Application

The Step 1 proposal for the EIC Accelerator requires 3 core documents, namely the proposal text, the pitch deck and a short video. In general, one can begin the writing and preparation process with any of these documents but it is recommended to begin with the written proposal, followed by the pitch deck and, lastly, the pitch video.

The reason for this order is that the written proposal will be the frame for how the application is presented to the EIC which will likely require adjustments of existing presentations and documents that a company might have available. An existing pitch deck might not be suitable for the EIC Accelerator so it is advisable to first frame the text in the most beneficial way and then move toward the annexes.

Since the pitch video is the most difficult to change in post-production, it is recommended to record it in the end so that there are no open questions regarding the presentation of the project to the EIC.

1.1 Proposal Text

The proposal text follows an online form on the EIC’s website which consists of a variety of questions. Each question provides a certain space (i.e. 1,000 or 500 characters) for a response which inherently limits the comprehensiveness of the application. The total number of text boxes that need to be written will depend on a variety of interactive functions such as the number of features & use cases, the risks and the staff.

In general, if a writer has a deep understanding of the company and the technology beforehand and is a fast as well as efficient writer then the text can be prepared in less than one week. If the project still lacks research and requires re-developments or customizations of the market, technology or the overall narrative then at least two to three weeks are necessary.

Note: Many companies have large amounts of data and texts from other proposals or presentations available but these generally cannot be used directly in an EIC Accelerator application without re-writing them due to the specific questions and space restrictions.

1.2 Pitch Deck

The pitch deck for Step 1 of the EIC Accelerator is generally limited to 10 slides (i.e. 11 slides incl. the title page). This reduces the amount of work needed for this document but can also introduce additional restrictions in case a company only has a variety of longer pitch decks available (see Read Deck).

The pitch deck often requires the professional grant writer to summarise existing pitch decks and to re-shape them into a narrative that is aligned with the EIC Accelerator. Even with a broad set of existing slides and pitch decks, this task can still require at least one or more days.

1.3 Pitch Video

While shooting a video for the EIC Accelerator can seem like a complex task, it is relatively simple and the process complexity will largely depend on the desired outcome. Since the EIC Accelerator videos will not be graded on their production quality, it would be sufficient to simply record a video call and upload it (see Video Preparation).

Still, some minimal production quality and editing are recommended since the video will likely be watched in each subsequent step of the evaluation process even up to the final Step 3 interviews.

In some cases, companies already have certain video footage available and, since there are no rules regarding what is and what is not allowed, they are free to simply use advertisements, interviews or other footage to present their project without recording any new material.

For all companies that do not have sufficient footage available, the general tasks for the pitch video creation are:

  1. Scripting
  2. Recording
  3. Editing

1.3.1 Scripting

Once the main proposal document has been completed, the scripting for a 3-minute video can be completed within a single day (see Scripting the Video).

1.3.2 Recording

The recording session with the key team members can likewise be performed in a single day since the footage per team member will be limited to one minute on average in the case of three participants.

1.3.3 Editing

The editing of a video generally requires more time than other parts but, since the video will have a maximum length of 3 minutes, it will still be possible to complete the post-production (i.e. cutting, titles, footage, color grading, audio) in a single day.

This timeline would increase if the editor creates animations or uses external footage to improve the video which is a creative process and will require more work.

1.4 Financials & Deliverables

While not part of the submitted Step 1 documents, it is critical to plan certain aspects of the project in Step 1 even though they will only be requested in Step 2. Such documents are related to the budget, the financials and the deliverables.

While it is unlikely that the evaluators would care if these aspects have been changed from Step 1 to Step 2, it is useful to already align all project cornerstones in the first Step. If this point is neglected, an evaluator might leave a criticism in the Step 1 evaluation which will be read by the Step 2 evaluators and might add additional scrutiny.

It is useful to decide on the general budget of the project (i.e. grant and equity – see Explanation), the financials of the company (i.e. preparing preliminary financial projections) and to prepare a general structure of the workpackages which must be presented as deliverables in Step 1.

These tasks are part of the writing process for the main proposal text.

1.5 Total Time for Step 1

1.5.1 Duration

An EIC Accelerator applicant should plan 1 month for the Step 1 document preparations but it is possible to prepare the documents in under 2 weeks if no research or re-development are needed.

1.5.2 Evaluation

The evaluation of the Step 1 proposal can take just a few days or multiple weeks depending on the workload experienced by the EIC’s remote evaluators. In general, a duration of 3 weeks should be expected but, if an applicant already has all the necessary templates, they can begin the Step 2 writing process as they wait for the Step 1 result.

Step 2: The Business Plan

The business plan is the most difficult and lengthy step in the EIC Accelerator process which consists of a main document and a variety of annexes such as:

  1. Letters of Intent (LOI)
  2. Pitch Deck
  3. Freedom to Operate Analysis (FTO)
  4. Data Management Plan (DMP)
  5. 10-Page Annex
  6. Financial Spreadsheet

2.1 Proposal Text

The proposal text is provided through an online form similar to the Step 1 application. In fact, some sections from Step 1 are automatically added to Step 2 since they present the same questions.

In general, the proposal text for Step 2 is very long and far exceeds the length of the documents prior to 2021 when the complete EIC Accelerator application template was reshaped.

2.2 Annexes

The EIC Accelerator’s Step 2 application allows a variety of mandatory and optional annexes to be uploaded which include Letters of Intent (LOI), a Freedom to Operate Analysis (FTO – see FTO Guide), a Data Management Plan (DMP), a financial spreadsheet, a pitch deck (see Pitch Interview) and a free 10-page overview.

2.2.1 Letters of Intent (LOI)

It can generally take weeks or even months to obtain LOI’s from relevant stakeholders since every company is busy and will likely not act rapidly. It is therefore advisable to send out requests for LOI’s as early as possible to maximize the chances of obtaining them before the Step 2 deadline (see Cut-Off’s).

This upload section dedicated to LOI’s can also be used to include documents such as contracts, customer lists, patent applications or other critical documents (i.e. translations).

2.2.2 Pitch Deck

The Step 2 pitch deck will follow a similar structure as the Step 1 pitch deck, albeit the page restriction has been removed which allows longer presentations and a rich appendix.

2.2.3 Freedom to Operate Analysis (FTO)

Most companies in the DeepTech or innovation space have an FTO available since it is a critical component of any innovative venture. For any company without an FTO, it is advisable to either prepare one in-house (see FTO Analysis) or to contract a law firm for the preparation.

2.2.4 Data Management Plan (DMP)

The DMP can be easily obtained through an online template but, in case a company has no DMP prepared, the EIC Accelerator allows a simple description of data handling to be added through a few sentences that can be prepared in under 30 minutes.

2.2.5 10-Pager

A 10-page annex can be uploaded which can be prepared in a single day since it will heavily feature images and photographs rather than additional text. This is due to the restriction of the EIC Accelerator’s main proposal text which is devoid of any images. The 10-pager, therefore, acts as a visual guide to the proposal, a company overview and a reference library.

2.2.6 Financials

The financial template consists of a single spreadsheet that must be filled. Since every company should have ample financial data in-house, it can be prepared rapidly. For applicants inexperienced with the EIC Accelerator, it can still be difficult to adjust to the particular format but an experienced grant writer can prepare the document in a single day.

2.3 Total Time for Step 2

2.3.1 Duration

Each applicant should allocate at least two months for the preparation of the EIC Accelerator Step 2 application.

2.3.2 Evaluation

The evaluation will approximately take 3-6 weeks after the submission of the EIC Accelerator Step 2 application but can also take longer. Since the Step 2 deadlines are set, in contrast to the Step 1 application which is open anytime, there are pre-defined time slots for the Step 2 applications and Step 3 interviews. As a result, the evaluation of Step 2 can take longer or be faster depending on the duration until the next Step 3 interviews.

Step 3: The Jury Interview

The preparation for the jury interview should be extensive and contain at least 5 practice calls while more are advisable (see Interview). It should likewise include a detailed analysis of all proposal materials in case some of the interviewees are unfamiliar with them.

3.1 Duration

The time needed for this preparation will depend on the speed of the EIC’s Step 2 evaluations and the available time until the interview week. At least 2 weeks should be planned for the interview preparation.

3.2 Evaluation

It generally takes 3-6 weeks until the Step 3 results will be published.

Resubmissions and Freezing Periods

The presented timelines in this article are indicative and there are a variety of factors that have not been discussed but can greatly change the time required for an application. There are fast-track programs that allow applicants to skip Step 1 of the application process, freezing periods of 12 months that block further submissions in case of multiple rejections, Step 2 deadlines that might be removed and other variables that must be taken into account.

There is no normal EIC Accelerator timeline for rejected or funded companies since there is a high degree of randomness in the evaluation process. Rejections and resubmissions are very common and can easily prolong the duration by multiple months.

For example, if a freezing period that prohibits further submissions for 12 months is reached then the application timeline will be prolonged by a year.

Conclusion

The EIC Accelerator remains a high-risk program and it is generally advisable to contract an external consultant for the preparation (see Contact) since it is lengthy, unpredictable and often tedious.

Additionally, any company that has a high chance of obtaining the EIC Accelerator funding is often too busy working on their innovation to spend multiple months or years with the EIC’s lengthy application process which renders outsourcing an essential step.

A company starting in Step 1 and obtaining the Step 3 GO grading (i.e. approval of funding) within 6 months is considered fast and this is generally only possible if no rejections occur in any of the three Steps. In contrast, obtaining at least one rejection in Step 2 or Step 3 is common and timelines for most applicants are often significantly longer than 6 months.

Additionally, the issuance of the grant and equity financing will likewise incur certain delays whereas the former is often obtained fast while the latter will be subject to additional due diligence.

This article was last modified on Mar 27, 2023 @ 18:56

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 (short proposal)
    • open now
  • Step 2 (business plan)
    • 1st cut-off: -
    • 2nd cut-off: -
    • 3rd cut-off: -
    • 4th cut-off: October 19th 2023 (extended)
  • Step 3 (interview)
    • 1st cut-off: -
    • 2nd cut-off: -
    • 3rd cut-off: October 2nd to 6th (extended)
    • 4th cut-off: November 27th to December 8th

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.

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).

Any more questions? View the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) section.

Want to see all articles? They can be found here.

For Updates: Join this Newsletter!


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)

EIC Accelerator, Horizon Europe, Phase 2, SME Instrument / EIC Accelerator

Investing in Well-Funded Projects: How the EIC is Breaking its Own Rules (EIC Accelerator)

The EIC Accelerator blended financing (formerly SME Instrument Phase 2, grant and equity) by the European Innovation Council (EIC) and European Commission (EC) awards up to €2.5 million in grant and €15 million in equity financing per project (€17.5 million total) to startups and Small- and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SME).

It is advertised as a risk-taking DeepTech fund that nurtures European innovation and allows companies that are early stage and too high risk for private investors to gain substantial financial investments and scale up to reach the market.

Startups often rely on consultants, professional writers or freelancers to help them assess their success chances since it is well-known that success rates for the EIC Accelerator are as low as 5% (see 2022 Results).

The EIC Accelerators Mission

The 2023 Work Programme 2023 explains the mission of the EIC Accelerator as follows (see Work Programme Analysis):

“The EIC Accelerator focuses in particular on innovations, building on scientific discovery or technological breakthroughs (‘deep tech’) and where significant funding is needed over a long timeframe before returns can be generated (‘patient capital’). Such innovations often struggle to attract financing because the risks and time period involved are too high. Funding and support from the EIC Accelerator is designed to enable such innovators to attract the full investment amounts needed for scale up in a shorter timeframe.“

This means that the EIC Accelerator, especially in the case of grant contributions, is designed to:

  • Fund DeepTech with high capital needs
  • Bridge the funding gap until revenues can be generated
  • Support projects that are too risky to attract private capital
  • Signaling to investors that a project is investable

This describes the ideal case for the EIC Accelerator since any technology that does not fit such criteria but has a groundbreaking and disruptive product would be financed through private markets. The EIC is a special vehicle to support high-risk and high-reward projects rather than to invest in “safe bets” which is not its role.

Breaking the Rules

An interesting exception to this mission has occurred in 2022 and, while this is likely not the only exception, it is an obvious one since it seems to be so far removed from the scope of the EIC that it warrants a discussion.

Note: The name of the company is omitted since this article is focusing on the EIC’s decision-making process and not on any individual beneficiary. Every company funded under the EIC Accelerator is likely well deserving and presents an impressive technology and business case irrespective of the EIC’s original mission. The exact cut-off and industry are likewise obscured.

What Is DeepTech?

The company is operating a software platform used in varying industry applications. Generally speaking, software products exhibit higher difficulty in receiving financing from the EIC Accelerator compared to hardware products due to the lower capital requirements and, generally, the higher availability of funds from private investors who expect faster Return on Investments (ROI) from software products compared to lengthy DeepTech developments.

This was likewise true for the software company in question which, by 2021, had already raised over €24 million in financing. Among EIC Accelerator beneficiaries, this is at the higher end of past funding amounts since most companies at Technology Readiness Level (TRL) 5-7 are struggling to raise substantial capital.

The company then applied to a Step 2 cut-off in 2022 of the EIC Accelerator for grant-only support. This is an interesting choice since grant-only applications are for a maximum amount of €2.5 million which is dwarfed by the already raised amount in excess of €24 million.

It could have made more logical sense from the EIC’s perspective if the company had difficulty raising a follow-up financing round and required a co-investment from the EIC Fund in the form of equity. This would have translated to blended financing or equity-only support rather than grant-only.

Furthermore, justifying the need for grant support by the EIC is not helped by the fact that the company already has substantial revenues.

A Drop In The Ocean

The EIC Accelerators’ mission is to bridge the financing gap for companies that have difficulties leveraging sufficient funding and are “stuck” in the valley of death between rounds due to lacking investor interest.

This particular software company could not be further from that mission since it had significant revenues, had raised substantial funding and does not obviously meet the general DeepTech case found in capital-intensive hardware projects.

A Role for the EIC

It could still be argued that the grant investment was essential to de-risk the project and to attract additional private financing. But, this would be questionable since the company has high staff numbers with a high burn rate that does not match the financing via grant-only support.

This new financing would be capped at €2.5 million since this is the maximum amount provided by the EIC grant and, since every company has to fill out and justify form fields regarding their difficulty in raising that financing, it should be expected that the same was true for this particular company.

The question becomes – what difference would this grant make for a company in that position? According to the EIC’s mission, it would be to help them if they “struggle to attract financing” or help to “attract full financing”.

As will be evident below, neither option is applicable.

Why Funding From Other Sources Was Not Available

Contrary to the EIC’s mission, funding was clearly available and de-risking the project with a comparatively small grant seemed unnecessary.

The application deadline for the Step 2 submissions is generally multiple weeks ahead of the Step 3 interviews which creates a waiting period between the steps. Right within that time frame, the company raised an additional €25+ million which it announced a few weeks before the Step 3 interview on its website.

This means that the company has raised at least 10-times as much funding as they would request a month later in front of the EIC Jury. It also meant that there was no role for the EIC to play since equity was not requested, funding was available and private investors were willing to invest already.

The EIC Jury was likely aware of the funding round and, even if this was not the case, the due diligence following the successful approval of the EIC Accelerators Step 3 would have identified this fact.

150+ Rejectees

This article is not designed to call out any particular company which is why the name was omitted. A company receiving the EIC Accelerator grant is always a cause for celebration and it shows that it has a timely, disruptive and excellent innovation.

What this article is about is the investigation of the EIC’s decision-making progress.

For the respective Step 2 deadline, 200+ companies were invited to the Step 3 interviews while 150+ companies ended up being rejected. All 150+ rejectees have successfully passed Step 1 and Step 2 which means that they are excellent innovation and business cases.

Some of them have likely resubmitted their applications and obtained the EIC Accelerator funding at a later date (see Resubmissions).

The question becomes: Were there no companies among the 150+ rejectees that fit the EIC’s mission more than the company discussed in this article?

Conclusion: Hypocrisy or Poor Communication?

It is important for the EIC to address cases that are outliers from the general scope of the EIC Accelerator to build trust with the ecosystem and to clearly manage the expectations of future applicants. This likewise extends to the large number of consultancies that are often the first stakeholders to interact with prospective applicants and must make accurate recommendations.

In conclusion, there are a variety of potential motives for this funding decision. The company was largely US-funded and the EIC could have tried to add financing to manufacture a closer relationship to the EU. Equity financing would be preferable but it appears that the beneficiary rejected that by applying for grant-only support.

Another likely explanation is that the Step 3 Jury selects the most investable companies irrespective of the EIC’s mission. The most investable companies are low-risk, have a good business model, have high scale-up potential, have existing revenues and have significant investor interest.

In contrast to the typical DeepTech case.

This article was last modified on Jan 23, 2023 @ 20:46

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 (short proposal)
    • open now
  • Step 2 (business plan)
    • 1st cut-off: -
    • 2nd cut-off: -
    • 3rd cut-off: -
    • 4th cut-off: October 19th 2023 (extended)
  • Step 3 (interview)
    • 1st cut-off: -
    • 2nd cut-off: -
    • 3rd cut-off: October 2nd to 6th (extended)
    • 4th cut-off: November 27th to December 8th

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.

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).

Any more questions? View the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) section.

Want to see all articles? They can be found here.

For Updates: Join this Newsletter!


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)

EIC Accelerator, Horizon Europe, Phase 2, SME Instrument / EIC Accelerator

A Short but Comprehensive Explanation of the EIC Accelerator

The EIC Accelerator blended financing (formerly SME Instrument Phase 2, grant and equity) by the European Commission (EC) and European Innovation Council (EIC) is a complex funding instrument for startups and Small- and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SME).

It is often supported by professional writers, freelancers or consultants since it can be challenging for startups to navigate the lengthy assessment and proposal writing process. This article aims to provide a brief but comprehensive overview of the program to help future applicants decide if the EIC Accelerator is the right instrument for them.

What is the EIC Accelerator?

The EIC Accelerator is a funding program by the European Commission (EC) and the European Innovation Council (EIC) as part of Horizon Europe.

It funds innovative DeepTech companies with grant and/or equity financing of up to €2.5 million and €15 million, respectively (see 2023 Budget).

Applicants can be from the EU-27 countries or from countries associated with Horizon Europe (see Eligibility).

The company’s technology should have reached Technology Readiness Level (TRL) of 5 at least and be able to reach TRL8 within 24 months but exceptions can apply (see Technology Readiness Levels).

What does the EIC Accelerator provide?

Next to business acceleration, coaching and networking opportunities, it provides funding in the form of 4 different application options:

  • Grant-only: A non-dilutive grant with the company reaching TRL8 at the end of the project and subsequently reaching TRL9 without the help of the EIC.
  • Grant-first: A non-dilutive grant with the company reaching TRL8 at the end of the project. There is an option to apply for dilutive equity financing from the EIC Fund afterward to reach TRL9 (see Grant-First).
  • Equity-only: Dilutive equity funding from the EIC Fund to reach TRL9.
  • Blended finance: A mix of non-dilutive grant and dilutive equity financing to reach TRL9 at the end of the project.

How do the different funding options finance development work?

In general, grant funding can only be used for activities up to TRL8 (i.e. TRL5 to TRL8) while equity funding can be used for developments up to TRL9 including innovation activities (i.e. TRL5 to TRL9).

What industries can apply and are there topic limitations?

The EIC publishes topics every year in the EIC Work Programme which outlines specific budget allocations. Generally, the budget is split between the options of an “Open” and a “Challenge” Call which are usually available on the same cut-off dates (see Deadline). A company can therefore decide which topic they would like to apply for. The two options are:

  • EIC Accelerator Open: This call is open to applicants of all industries provided they are not violating the agendas of the European Union (EU) in terms of climate, human rights, ethics and other political and social targets.
  • EIC Accelerator Challenges: These topics are clearly defined technology and industry themes that must be achieved or covered by the applicant (see EIC Accelerator Challenges). The applicant can select the respective Challenge during the Step 2 submission process.

When and how can I apply?

The EIC Accelerator generally has 3-4 cut-offs per year which are set for Step 2 submissions (see Deadline). The following conditions apply:

  • Step 1: This step encompasses a short application including a pitch deck (see Pitch Deck), a video (see Pitch Video) and a short proposal. Submitting a proposal is possible at all times since the call is continuously open.
  • Step 2: This step requires a very detailed business plan in addition to multiple annexes such as financials, Letters of Intent (LOI), a Freedom to Operate (FTO) analysis, a Data Management Plan (DMP), a pitch deck and a customizable company profile. After Step 1 has been passed, the applicants can apply to Step 2 to any of the designated deadlines (see Deadlines).
  • Step 3: This step is an interview with the EIC Jury that is usually conducted online through a video call. It encompasses a 10-minute pitch by the applicant using the pitch deck submitted in Step 2 and an up to 35-minute Question and Answer session by the jury (see Interview Preparation). If Step 2 has been passed successfully, the interview dates are generally a few weeks after the Step 2 evaluation was completed.

The EU application process is performed on a dedicated website provided by the EIC where an online form is acting as the proposal template. Each applicant can create the appropriate proposals and begin writing applications inside the web browser although it is recommended to use off-platform templates to prepare all documents in collaboration with a team and then upload the content for the submission.

What does the result of an application look like?

The EIC has increased the level of transparency compared to earlier years and has introduced detailed feedback from evaluators. For Step 1 and Step 2, four or three evaluators will grade the application, respectively, and leave feedback for the applicants.

  • Each evaluator will be able to grade the proposal with a GO or NO GO rating.
  • For Step 1, at least 2/4 of evaluators have to provide a GO for the application to be successful.
  • For Step 2, at least 3/3 of evaluators have to provide a GO for the application to be successful.

Feedback is provided to the applicants irrespective of the GO or NO GO grading through detailed responses by the evaluators for all evaluation criteria (see Evaluation Criteria).

For the Step 3 interviews, a unanimous decision by the EIC Jury is presented and the applicants likewise receive responses regarding the evaluation criteria as well as the GO or NO GO result.

If the applicant passes all three steps, the preparation for the Grant Agreement Contract (GAC) and a due diligence process are initiated.

How long does it take to apply for the EIC Accelerator?

The time it takes to apply for the EIC Accelerator will differ depending on the number of resubmissions and the efficiency of preparing an application. It can be further delayed if the due diligence process is slowed down from the side of the EIC.

In general, one can expect a timeline of 2-4 weeks for the preparation of Step 1 followed by a 5-30 day average assessment period. For Step 2, a 50-70 day preparation period followed by a 30-40 day assessment period should be expected. With the Step 3 interviews following approximately 2-6 weeks after the Step 2 result is obtained, one can add an additional 3-5 weeks to receive the final grading by the EIC Jury.

A fast application process can go from the Step 1 start to Step 3 approval within 6 months if no rejections have occurred and if all documents were prepared efficiently without waiting times.

In case of rejections and multiple resubmissions, the total process can also take multiple years and there is never a guarantee that a project will be funded.

What are the success chances for the EIC Accelerator?

Since the 3-Step application process is complex, it is difficult to estimate exact numbers for success rates. If 1,000 companies apply for Step 1 and 70% receive a GO over multiple weeks then it cannot be determined based on the published data how many of these exact companies proceed to the subsequent Step 2 deadline (see Deadlines).

The metrics are further obscured through the previous batch being able to resubmit their applications or abandon the application entirely.

Based on past data, the following estimations can be made (see 2021, 2022A, 2022B):

  • Step 1: ~67% pass rate
  • Step 2: ~22% pass rate
  • Step 3: ~32.5% pass rate
  • Total EIC Accelerator success rate: 4.8%

What limitations exist regarding the submissions?

The EIC Accelerator has introduced freezing periods for resubmissions whereas every applicant generally receives two attempts for each written proposal step (i.e. “two strikes, you’re out”). This means that a company that has failed twice in Step 1 will be blocked from submitting the same application for 12 months. The same is true for Step 2 applications.

There are nuances in the case of the Step 3 interviews which are explained here: Resubmission Process Explained.

What types of companies actually win the EIC Accelerator grant?

The companies that generally win the EIC Accelerator are often DeepTech hardware businesses but there are likewise software and IT industry winners among the funded projects (complete beneficiary lists are linked here: 2021, 2022A, 2022B).

How do I know if I should apply or not?

Predicting who will receive funding under the EIC is difficult even for seasoned consultancies. While it is possible to estimate the chances, the level of randomness during the evaluation process and the unknown variables introduced by the company during the proposal writing process render any estimate to be speculative.

If the company has an excellent technology, a great team, a scalable business model and is aligned with EU interests then the EIC Accelerator is worth pursuing.

Here is a list of general considerations for an ideal project: A Winning EIC Accelerator Candidate

This article was last modified on Feb 19, 2023 @ 23:35

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 (short proposal)
    • open now
  • Step 2 (business plan)
    • 1st cut-off: -
    • 2nd cut-off: -
    • 3rd cut-off: -
    • 4th cut-off: October 19th 2023 (extended)
  • Step 3 (interview)
    • 1st cut-off: -
    • 2nd cut-off: -
    • 3rd cut-off: October 2nd to 6th (extended)
    • 4th cut-off: November 27th to December 8th

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.

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).

Any more questions? View the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) section.

Want to see all articles? They can be found here.

For Updates: Join this Newsletter!


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)

EIC Accelerator, Horizon Europe, Phase 2, SME Instrument / EIC Accelerator, Success

EIC Accelerator 2022 October Results: Funding Rates and Circu Li-ion & Iris.AI Success Cases

The EIC Accelerator blended financing (formerly SME Instrument Phase 2, grant and equity) has recently closed its last funding round of 2022 (see Deadlines). Following the multi-step grant application process, the last Step 2 deadline was set on October 5th while the interviews for Step 3 were being conducted in December (see Interview Preparation Process).

Designed for startups and Small- and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SME), the EIC Accelerator awards up to €2.5 million in grant and €15 million in equity financing per project (maximum of €17.5 million total). This article provides an overview of the latest cut-off results as well as useful information for professional writers, freelancers or consultants (see Eligible Applicants).

While the previous cut-off’s have seen high levels of competitiveness with success rates of approximately 5% for all three evaluation steps, this article analyses the success rates for the latest cut-off (see June 2021 & May 2022).

The October 2022 Cut-Off

In general, the total success rates are obscured through the 3-step application process where not all steps are associated with a deadline and not all applicants successively apply to the next steps. Since there is a possibility for re-submitting proposals and skipping application deadlines, the calculations in this article should be viewed as approximate (PDF, article).

Step 1

The exact success rates are difficult to assess but based on past data, an average success rate of 67% can be assumed (June 2021).

Step 2 & 3

Out of 1,092 Step 2 applicants, 240 were invited to the Step 3 interviews (22%) while a total of 78 companies were successfully selected for funding. This yields a total EIC Accelerator success rate of 7.1% starting at Step 2 and an interview selection rate of 32.5% for Step 3.

Multiplying the Step 2 and 3 success rates with the average success rate for Step 1 yields an approximate total success rate for the complete EIC Accelerator application process of 4.8%.

Funding Breakdown

  • Grant-only: 12 funded companies (15.4%)
  • Grant-first: 21 funded companies (26.9%)
  • Equity-only: 1 funded company (1.3%)
  • Blended finance: 44 funded companies (56.4%)

The total budget allocated to the 78 winners is €470 million which corresponds to an average EIC Accelerator ticket size of €6.03 million.

Circu Li-ion Receives the EIC Accelerator Funding

Circu Li-ion (Luxembourg) is addressing one of the greatest challenges of the coming decade: Sustainable battery energy storage. Renewable energy installations, electric vehicles, power tools, micromobility and utility systems all depend on battery storage but Lithium is becoming increasingly scarce and expensive.

With large quantities of batteries reaching their end-of-life after only a few years of operation, Circu Li-ion has identified that there is an urgent need to establish an upcycling ecosystem that is able to scale with the exponential industry growth.

By reusing end-of-life batteries and giving them a second life, Circu Li-ion is addressing a major industry pain point through its automated, data-driven and AI-controlled upcycling technology.

Note: Circu Li-ion was supported by Segler Consulting throughout the entire application process.

Iris.AI

Special congratulations to Iris.AI (Norway) which has received the EIC Accelerator financing as well and was supported by Segler Consulting in some of the application stages.

This article was last modified on Dec 22, 2022 @ 01:00

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 (short proposal)
    • open now
  • Step 2 (business plan)
    • 1st cut-off: -
    • 2nd cut-off: -
    • 3rd cut-off: -
    • 4th cut-off: October 19th 2023 (extended)
  • Step 3 (interview)
    • 1st cut-off: -
    • 2nd cut-off: -
    • 3rd cut-off: October 2nd to 6th (extended)
    • 4th cut-off: November 27th to December 8th

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.

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).

Any more questions? View the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) section.

Want to see all articles? They can be found here.

For Updates: Join this Newsletter!


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)

EIC Accelerator, Horizon Europe, SME Instrument / EIC Accelerator

The Grant Proposal Evaluation Criteria (2023 EIC Accelerator Work Programme Part 6)

The EIC Accelerator funding (grant and equity, with blended financing option) awards up to €2.5 million in grant and €15 million in equity financing per project (€17.5 million total). It is a popular funding instrument specializing in DeepTech startups and small mid-caps which aim to finalize their product developments, enter the market and scale globally.

The EIC’s 2023 Work programme

While the European Innovation Council (EIC) has remained silent regarding the 2023 Work programme that is yet to be released, ScienceBusiness has published the second draft of the highly anticipated document dated July 2022. This article series is exploring some changes and interesting aspects of the EIC Accelerator that are relevant for startups and Small- and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SME) and for professional writers, freelancers or consultants.

ScienceBusiness has likewise published the entire library of Horizon Europe documents by the European Commission (EC) that are mostly in draft form and can be found here.

All the information and conclusions provided in this article are subject to change and the opinion of the author. The following statement by the EIC is part of the 2023 EIC Work Programme draft that this article is based on:

“This document represents a working draft of the EIC work programme for the purpose of feedback and comments from members of the Horizon Europe Programme Committee for the EIC and European Innovation Ecosystems. This draft has not been adopted or endorsed by the European Commission. Any views expressed are the views of the Commission services and may not in any circumstances be regarded as stating an official position of the Commission. The information transmitted is intended only for the Member State or entity to which it is addressed for discussions and may contain confidential and/or privileged material.”

Evaluation Criteria for the Short Application (Step 1)

The evaluation criteria for the EIC Accelerators short application have remained largely consistent whereas the 2023 EIC Work Programme outlines the following scoring criteria for Step 1 applications.

1. Excellence

  • Breakthrough and market creating nature: Does the innovation have a high degree of novelty – compared to existing products, services and business models – with the potential to create or significantly transform markets?

  • Timing: Is the timing right for this innovation in terms of market, user, societal or scientific of technological trends and developments?

2. Impact

  • Scale up potential: Does the innovation have scale up potential, including the potential to develop new markets and impact on the growth of the company? Does the company show a clear and convincing vision, taking into account its current level of development and maturity, in relation to the targeted market, the business model and growth forecasts?

  • Broader impact: Will the innovation, if successfully commercialized achieve positive broader societal, economic, environmental or climate impacts?

3. Level of risk, implementation, and need for Union support

  • Team: Does the team have the capability and motivation to implement the innovation proposal and bring it to the market? Is there a plan to acquire any critical competencies which are currently missing, including adequate representation of women and men?

Complaints and Rebuttals for Step 1 Rejectees

In 2021, the EIC has made a significant step towards transparency by allowing all EIC Accelerator applicants to view comments from the evaluators who have reviewed their proposals. While this is of tremendous benefit to applicants, it has likewise exposed a certain degree of randomness in the way applications are graded including mistakes, negligence or plain ignorance.

This is, of course, to be expected and only natural when facing thousands of applications and multiple reviewers per proposal. Still, this has inevitably led to complaints regarding specific Evaluation Summary Reports (ESR) and especially the remote evaluators.

While the EIC has tried to investigate such complaints in the past, the vast majority of applicants were simply told to re-apply to the next cut-off and summarize their rebuttal in the resubmission of their proposal (i.e. via the email of the European Innovation Council and SME’s Executive Agency: support@eic.eismea.eu).

The new 2023 Work Programme is outlining the conditions for issuing a formal complaint as opposed to relying on the resubmission of rejected Step 1 proposals.

“You may file a complaint if you believe that the evaluator(s) made an incorrect assessment on the following grounds:

  1. a factual mistake;
  2. absence of information which is not required at short proposal stage; and
  3. a manifest error of appreciation on the scope and purpose of the Accelerator.”

Unfortunately, this has only limited use since the EIC Accelerator’s Step 1 is by far the easiest step. If the same rule was applied to Step 2 full applications then the EIC would likely find themselves with a valid complaint for the majority of rejected applicants since it is common to encounter at least one factual mistake in any given Evaluation Summary Report (i.e. misreading Letters of Intent, Freedom to Operate analyses or missing critical information).

In case a rejected Step 1 application is retroactively given a GO grading (i.e. passing the step successfully) then they are able to apply to Step 2 at the original deadline that was reachable in their previous submission.

“If your proposal is reevaluated as a GO, you will be eligible to introduce your full application to the same cutoff date that you would have been able to submit to, with a GO from the initial evaluation.”

This second quote from the EIC’s 2023 Work Programme draft is obscure but this can be understood as the EIC allowing Step 2 applicants to hand in applications past the deadline in case a complaint was approved. But this seems unrealistic due to time constraints in the preparation of Step 2 applications and the limited time window of the evaluation prior to the fixed interview deadlines.

Evaluation Criteria for the Full Application (Step 2)

For the EIC Accelerator’s Step 2, the evaluation criteria are defined as follows

1. Excellence

  • Breakthrough and market creating nature: Does the innovation have a high degree of novelty, compared to existing products, services and business models, with the potential to create or significantly transform markets?

  • Additional sub-criterion for EIC Accelerator Challenges ONLY: How relevant are the proposal objectives in contributing to the specific objectives of the Challenge?

  • Timing: Is the timing right for this innovation in terms of market, user, societal or scientific of technological trends and developments?

  • Technological feasibility: Is the innovation based on a technology or technologies that have been adequately assessed at least in a laboratory environment and relevant environments to characterise the potential and assess the level of risk (at least TRL 5/6)? Is the technology developed in a safe, secure and reliable manner?

  • Intellectual Property: Does your company have the necessary Intellectual Property Rights to ensure freedom to operate and adequate protection of the idea?

2. Impact

  • Scale up potential: Does the innovation have scale up potential, including the potential to develop new markets and impact on the growth of the company? Are the associated financial needs well assessed and realistic?

  • Broader impact: Will the innovation, if successfully commercialised achieve positive broader societal, economic, environmental or climate impacts?

  • Additional sub-criterion for EIC Accelerator Challenges ONLY: Does the proposed application have the potential to contribute to the expected outcomes and impacts set out in the Challenge?

  • Market fit and competitor analysis: Has the potential market for the innovation been adequately assessed, including conditions and growth rates? Has a competitive analysis been thoroughly performed, including identification of potential customers and relevant types of users, including women and men, definition of unique selling points and key differentiation from competitors?

  • Commercialisation strategy: Is there a convincing and well thought-through strategy for commercialisation, including regulatory approvals/compliance needed, time to market/deployment, and business and revenue model?

  • Key partners: Have the key partners required to develop and commercialize the innovation been identified and engaged, including their roles/competences and a sufficient level of commitment and incentivisation?

3. Level of risk, implementation, and need for Union support

  • Team: Does the team have the capability and motivation to implement the innovation proposal and bring it to the market? Is there a plan to acquire any critical competencies which are currently missing, including adequate representation of women and men?

  • Milestones: Is there a clear implementation plan with defined milestones, work packages and deliverables, together with realistic resources and timings?

  • Risk level of the investment: Does the nature and level of risk of the investment in your innovation mean that European market actors are unwilling to commit the full amount alone? Is there evidence that market actors would be willing to invest, either alongside the EIC or at a later stage?

  • Note: Small mid-caps will be expected to provide documentary evidence that their bank has refused the financing needed for the project.

  • Risk mitigation: Have the main risks (e.g. technological, market, financial, regulatory) been identified, together with measures to take to mitigate them?

Step 3 Interview Criteria

For the Step 3 interviews, the same vague criteria used in the previous iterations of the EIC Accelerator apply (read: How to Prepare for the Interview). An interesting feature of the Step 3 interviews is that the EIC Jury can consult external analysts who will assess the project prior to the interview.

“Jury members will also have access to analyses (for example on financial metrics) generated by the EIC AI-based platform and in certain cases the independent assessment of a specialised expert in the field of science or technology. Such analyses will be made available to applicants after the decision.”

This might provide only limited usefulness since it would be more beneficial to make the scientific and technical aspects a fundamental part of the Step 3 selection rather than an optional add-on.

Otherwise, a groundbreaking battery startup without revenues or customer commitments could consistently lose against a software company with excellent financial health and competitive advantages but only limited technological or scientific breakthroughs. In the same way, a scientific team with only 2 or 3 employees will have a difficult time convincing the EIC Jury while a technical Jury member might be impressed by the technology and achievements while being more optimistic.

Through the outsourcing of the EIC Fund’s management to the European Investment Bank (EIB) and Alter Domus (Luxembourg), the EIC could become more risk-averse and, while it claims to fund DeepTech at TRL5, it might end up only picking projects that are already in the market or have significant customer commitments.

This article is part of a series whereas the remaining articles can be found here, once published:

This article was last modified on Nov 5, 2022 @ 10:17

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 (short proposal)
    • open now
  • Step 2 (business plan)
    • 1st cut-off: -
    • 2nd cut-off: -
    • 3rd cut-off: -
    • 4th cut-off: October 19th 2023 (extended)
  • Step 3 (interview)
    • 1st cut-off: -
    • 2nd cut-off: -
    • 3rd cut-off: October 2nd to 6th (extended)
    • 4th cut-off: November 27th to December 8th

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.

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).

Any more questions? View the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) section.

Want to see all articles? They can be found here.

For Updates: Join this Newsletter!


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)

EIC Accelerator, Horizon Europe, SME Instrument / EIC Accelerator

Technology Readiness Levels, Timelines and Interview Priorities (2023 EIC Accelerator Work Programme Part 4)

The EIC Accelerator funding (grant and equity, with blended financing option) awards up to €2.5 million in grant and €15 million in equity financing per project (€17.5 million total). It is a popular funding instrument specializing in DeepTech startups and small mid-caps which aim to finalize their product developments, enter the market and scale globally.

The EIC’s 2023 Work programme

While the European Innovation Council (EIC) has remained silent regarding the 2023 Work programme that is yet to be released, ScienceBusiness has published the second draft of the highly anticipated document dated July 2022. This article series is exploring some changes and interesting aspects of the EIC Accelerator that are relevant for startups and Small- and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SME) and for professional writers, freelancers or consultants.

ScienceBusiness has likewise published the entire library of Horizon Europe documents by the European Commission (EC) that are mostly in draft form and can be found here.

All the information and conclusions provided in this article are subject to change and the opinion of the author. The following statement by the EIC is part of the 2023 EIC Work Programme draft that this article is based on:

“This document represents a working draft of the EIC work programme for the purpose of feedback and comments from members of the Horizon Europe Programme Committee for the EIC and European Innovation Ecosystems. This draft has not been adopted or endorsed by the European Commission. Any views expressed are the views of the Commission services and may not in any circumstances be regarded as stating an official position of the Commission. The information transmitted is intended only for the Member State or entity to which it is addressed for discussions and may contain confidential and/or privileged material.”

Technology Readiness Levels (TRL)

In the new 2023 EIC Work Programme, the Technology Readiness Levels (TRL) have been slightly simplified from the previous iteration whereas the new TRL’s are as follows (read: How the EIC Funds TRL’s):

  1. basic principles observed
  2. technology concept formulated
  3. experimental proof of concept
  4. technology validated in lab
  5. technology validated in relevant environment
  6. technology demonstrated in relevant environment
  7. system prototype demonstration in operational environment
  8. system complete and qualified
  9. actual system proven in operational environment

Deadlines

Unfortunately, the newest deadlines or cut-offs for the 2023 EIC Accelerator have not been published with the released draft of the EIC’s Work Programme. Once they are known, they will be available here: EIC Accelerator Deadlines.

While the draft of the 2023 Work Programme is still unofficial, it contained a hint that the EIC Accelerator’s first cut-off will only focus on the EIC Accelerator Open while the Strategic Challenges do not apply to the first date.

“[Cutoff dates to be inserted] [for first cut-off, only Accelerator Open (not Accelerator challenges)]”

For the EIC Pathfinder Open, the first deadline in 2023 was given as:

“The deadline for submitting your proposal is 7 March 2023 at 17h00 Brussels local Time.”

Timelines

The timelines outlined in the 2023 Work Programme for the evaluations of EIC Accelerator proposals are 4 weeks for Step 1 and 6 weeks for Step 2 but these times can vary greatly depending on the workload encountered by the EIC.

The timing is also affected by the set dates for the Step 3 interviews whereas the EIC will be faster on occasions when the interview week is close while they can be slower if the interview week is far out.

EIC Accelerator Step 3 Interviews and Budgets

The EIC’s 2023 Work Programme defines priority orders in case of limitations in the budget or interview slots encountered by applicants. If the number of applicants or their budget requests exceeds the available resources, the applications will be prioritized by their recommendation status for the interview, the sex of the company’s CEO and the timing of the initial submission.

The priority order is:

  1. “All companies that were invited by the jury to resubmit directly to one of the next interview sessions;
  2. Gender balance: women-led companies (up to 40% of invited companies is reached);
  3. Submission date and time: any remaining companies will be prioritised based on the date and time submission of their short proposal.

The remaining batch of companies to interview will be invited to a further set of interviews to be organised before the interviews of the next cut-off date.”

And this priority order also applies for the budget allocations:

“In case the amount allocated to GO applicants is above the budget available, then a number of applicants corresponding to the unavailable budget will be awarded funding using the available budget of the subsequent cut-off. Such applicants will be identified using the ordering set out above for the invitation to interviews.”

This article is part of a series whereas the remaining articles can be found here, once published:

This article was last modified on Nov 5, 2022 @ 10:15

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 (short proposal)
    • open now
  • Step 2 (business plan)
    • 1st cut-off: -
    • 2nd cut-off: -
    • 3rd cut-off: -
    • 4th cut-off: October 19th 2023 (extended)
  • Step 3 (interview)
    • 1st cut-off: -
    • 2nd cut-off: -
    • 3rd cut-off: October 2nd to 6th (extended)
    • 4th cut-off: November 27th to December 8th

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.

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).

Any more questions? View the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) section.

Want to see all articles? They can be found here.

For Updates: Join this Newsletter!


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)

EIC Accelerator, Horizon Europe, Phase 2, SME Instrument / EIC Accelerator, Success

The June 2021 EIC Accelerator Results and the STABL Energy GmbH Success Story

The EIC Accelerator blended financing (formerly SME Instrument Phase 2, grant and equity) has finally completed its first iteration in 2021 despite the delayed launch of Horizon Europe (2021-2027) and only two deadlines in this first year. With the application process having changed dramatically after Horizon 2020 (2014-2020) ended, many professional writers and consultants had to adapt their approach to grant preparations (read: Re-Inventing the EIC Accelerator). With a longer proposal document, new templates, pitch videos, read-only pitch decks and more supporting information being requested, it was an interesting experiment for both the applicants and the European Innovation Council (EIC).

Many Small- and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SME) and startups have applied to the EIC’s grant and, as has always been the case, only a fraction has been successful. The following article describes one of these success cases as well as the overall statistics of the June 2021 EIC Accelerator call.

The June 2021 EIC Accelerator Call

With the application process having changed dramatically, it comes as no surprise that there were many differences compared to the 2020 cut-offs. One of these differences is that the final statistics for the June deadline are not as clear as they were in 2020 since the new 3-Step process has an obscured number of total applicants.

This is due to the fact that there is no Step 1 deadline and it is unknown how many of the approved Step 1 projects actually applied to Step 2 in June since a significant number might have delayed the application to October 2021. The information communicated by the EIC is also limited with makes a detailed look at the overall statistics difficult.

Nonetheless, with the information that is available today (Linkedin: Nicolas Sabatier and EIC Support), one can conclude that:

Step 1

On May 17th, 67% or 755 out of 1,114 applicants had passed the threshold and received a GO for Step 1. With the Step 2 deadline having been on June 16th, this number continued to increase since at least 1,523 total Step 1 applications had been submitted at this point in time (but not all were evaluated yet). It is unlikely that all Step 1 successes decided to apply to the June deadline since, due to the limited time, many might have postponed the application to October 2021. If the success rate of selected applications has remained the same and 801 applicants eventually applied to Step 2 then an approximate 1,196 applicants have applied to Step 1 with the intention to apply to Step 2 in June 2021, yielding 801 approved projects and a 67% success rate for Step 1.

Note: To calculate a success rate for June 2021, one has to filter the number of applicants who applied to Step 1 and aimed for the June 2021 cut-off. It must also be considered that many rejected companies might not have applied to Step 2 even if they were selected. Since there is no publically available data on this, the numbers given here are estimated.

Step 2

With the deadline having been on June 16th 2021 (it was delayed by 7 days from its original date), the number of applicants amounted to 801. It was later announced that 130 applicants were selected for the interviews, thereby yielding a 16% success rate for this Step.

Step 3

The EIC Accelerator pitch week occurred via remove video calls with the EIC Jury and was conducted in mid-September 2021. Out of the 130 candidates, 65 were able to convince the Jury and succeed in gaining the EIC Accelerator funding. This yielded a 50% success rate for this Step although 24 Swiss applicants were excluded from the process due to the political developments between the EU and the Swiss government.

Step 1-3 Total

With success rates of 67%, 16% and 50% for the respective Steps, the overall success rate for the June 2021 EIC Accelerator was an approximate 5.4% with 65 out of an estimated 1,196 applicants having been successful.

Additional Statistics

Budget

The original budget in the official EIC Accelerator Work Programme (read: The 2021 EIC Accelerator Work Programme) was set at €500M+ but, due to the lack of excellent cases, it was reduced in retrospect (i.e. only €360M+ were allocated to successful candidates). This is a very interesting development since the 2020 applications tended to have far more suitable candidates while budgets were generally too low.

In fact, all 2020 projects with a score of over 13 out of 15 were technically eligible to receive funding, pending the Jury assessment, and the total budgets requested by said projects were, as an example, €1.8B in January 2020 or €2.7B in May 2020. If a Jury assessment were to be applied and only 50% of selected companies were approved, it would still yield budgets that far exceed the 2021 numbers.

It is clear that the EIC Accelerator has become more selective. But it has also become less selective in some ways.

It is more selective since it had an excess budget but deemed most companies to be unsuitable to receive this funding. It has become less selective since success rates have exceeded 5% while 2020 saw rates between 1% and 3%.

A reasonable conclusion to make is that the new barrier for the EIC Accelerator is not the chasing of decimal points (i.e. a 2020 score of 13.7 could be invited to the interviews while 13.6 is not) but the effort applied to preparing the proposal documents for each step. Since many companies have no interest in spending such an extreme effort for almost a year, the pool of serious applicants will be minimized. If this is a good process will remain to be seen but, clearly, the European Innovation Council is not afraid to innovate.

Note: As this was the first cut-off of the new EIC Accelerator, the success rates and budget allocation might differ greatly for the October deadline and those in 2022.

Gender

The EIC has managed to gain a 20% ratio for female entrepreneurs amongst all beneficiaries (i.e. female CEO’s) due to its strict gender equity goals.

Top 3 Countries

Clear winners during this 2021 Call in June were France (18% of the successful beneficiaries), Germany (17%) and the Netherlands (12%).

Type of Funding

92% of successful applicants received both grant and equity financing (blended finance) according to the EIC’s Twitter account but this data does not seem to fit the beneficiaries list. The more accurate and official list of all beneficiaries shows the following statistic:

  • 31/65 blended (48%)
  • 5/65 grant-only (8%)
  • 24/65 grant-first (37%)
  • 5/65 equity-only (8%)

Note: The given statistics of 92% of applicants receiving grant and equity financing would fit if either the 8% grant-only or the 8% equity-only was excluded from the total. Although, this does not seem to yield an accurate statement and is likely an error.

EIC Accelerator Success: STABL Energy GmbH

One of the 11 funded German projects is STABL Energy GmbH which has been among the 5% of selected applicants. During the 6 month process after Step 1 opened in April 2021, they were able to successfully pass all three Steps of the EIC Accelerator evaluation and succeed in securing blended financing under the EIC.

STABL is developing innovative power electronics for Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS) and, with their modular approach, they are able to deliver unprecedented benefits to the industry such as higher energy efficiency, software control, unique data services and lifecycle extensions through second-life use cases.

Why STABL was the perfect fit for the EIC Accelerator

STABL is enabling a sustainable, versatile and future-proof energy storage ecosystem that serves all relevant industries such as utilities, renewables and electric transport. As such, it was able to be part of the Green Deal Strategic Challenge and was an ideal fit for the subsegment of Battery and Energy Storage which was amongst the preferred project types (read: EIC Accelerator Work Programme).

In addition, STABL is a startup with high-level partnerships, traction and an excellent management team. The EIC aims to fund ambitious companies such as STABL that have a strong vision and the capability to realise them as well as the ability to change the European technological landscape for the better.

Note: Segler Consulting has supported STABL Energy GmbH for the entire application process.

This article was last modified on Feb 19, 2023 @ 23:34

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 (short proposal)
    • open now
  • Step 2 (business plan)
    • 1st cut-off: -
    • 2nd cut-off: -
    • 3rd cut-off: -
    • 4th cut-off: October 19th 2023 (extended)
  • Step 3 (interview)
    • 1st cut-off: -
    • 2nd cut-off: -
    • 3rd cut-off: October 2nd to 6th (extended)
    • 4th cut-off: November 27th to December 8th

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.

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).

Any more questions? View the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) section.

Want to see all articles? They can be found here.

For Updates: Join this Newsletter!


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)

EIC Accelerator, Horizon Europe, Phase 2, SME Instrument / EIC Accelerator

Delays: Updates on the EIC Accelerators Step 1 Results, Step 3 Interview Dates and More (SME Instrument)

The EIC Accelerator blended financing (formerly SME Instrument Phase 2, grant and equity) has opened its doors to Step 1 submissions in early April 2021. After a long wait, the first evaluation results have been published on May 12th 2021 after more than one month of evaluations. While no notifications of these results were sent to applicants, a delayed email signed by Head of Unit Cornelius Schmaltz was sent 2 days later which contained an official letter detailing the results of the Step 1 evaluation.

This article presents a short update on the specifics of the process as conducted by the European Innovation Council (EIC) with respect to the templates, deadlines and further evaluation stages:

  • EIC Accelerator Step 1 results have been released on May 12th 2021 on the EIC’s AI Platform for those who have applied by mid-April 2021.
  • Detailed feedback and a scoring (GO vs. NO GO) from 4 to 6 evaluators are provided for each project giving all applicants the most elaborate information on their submission yet. A detailed analysis of these evaluations will follow in a separate article.
  • The EIC aimed to simulate the past Seal of Excellence (SOE) threshold in Step 1 which means that 2020’s scoring threshold of ’13’ should be as difficult to pass as 2021’s Step 1. This would have meant that 70% of all applicants were rejected but it seems like it was rather only less than 50% being rejected. This would match the previously predicted effort-chances scenario 1 in this article.
  • The official template for Step 2 has already been published but the AI Platform for Step 2 is not ready yet.
  • The Step 2 AI Tool’s Ideation and Development modules will be available as of May 17th 2021.
  • The Step 2 AI Tool’s Go2Market module will be available as of May 21st 2021.
  • The coach selection module will become available on May 25th 2021.
  • In-person coaching support is offered on a first-come-first-serve basis in June 2021 but will be available for all applicants for their submission to the October 2021 deadline.
  • The interview sessions are planned in:
    • September 2021 for proposals submitted to the June 2021 deadline.
    • December 2021 or January 2022 for proposals submitted to the October 2021 deadline.

The Step 3 interviews come with a significant delay and instead of being 6 weeks after the Step 2 deadline, they are pushed back to 3 months after the June cut-off (read: Having a Successful Interview Pitch).

This article was last modified on May 14, 2021 @ 09:17

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 (short proposal)
    • open now
  • Step 2 (business plan)
    • 1st cut-off: -
    • 2nd cut-off: -
    • 3rd cut-off: -
    • 4th cut-off: October 19th 2023 (extended)
  • Step 3 (interview)
    • 1st cut-off: -
    • 2nd cut-off: -
    • 3rd cut-off: October 2nd to 6th (extended)
    • 4th cut-off: November 27th to December 8th

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.

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).

Any more questions? View the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) section.

Want to see all articles? They can be found here.

For Updates: Join this Newsletter!


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)