EIC Accelerator 2026 - Short application

EIC Accelerator 2026 - Short proposal General conditions 1. Admissibility Conditions: Proposal page limit and layout To be an eligible applicant to EIC Accelerator, you must apply as one of the following eligible entities: a single company classified as a SME, and established within a Member State or an Associated Country (see Annex 2 of the EIC Work Programme 2026); or a single company classified as a small mid-cap (up to 499 employees) established in a Member State or an Associated Country, but only for exceptional cases for rapid scale up purposes; or one or more natural persons (including individual entrepreneurs) or legal entities, which are either: a. from a Member State or an Associated Country intending to establish an SME or small mid-cap (as defined above) in a Member State or Associated Country by the time of signing the EIC Accelerator grant agreement or, in case the equity only is awarded, at the latest at the date of signature of the agreement on its investment component; b. intending to invest in an SME or small mid-cap established in a Member State or an Associated Country and may submit a proposal on behalf of that SME or small mid-cap, provided that a prior agreement exists with the company. The grant agreement and/or the investment agreement will be signed with the beneficiary/final recipient of funding company only; or c. from a non-associated third country intending to establish an SME (including start-ups) or to relocate an existing SME to a Member State or an Associated Country. Your company must prove its effective establishment in a Member State or an Associated Country at the time of submission of the full proposal. The standard admissibility and eligibility conditions are detailed in Annex 2 of the EIC Work Programme 2026. There are limitations on the number of times you can submit a proposal described in the section Application submission limits of the EIC Work Programme 2026. If you are currently a participant in an eligible project funded by Horizon Europe or Horizon 2020 then you may be able to apply through your existing project under the Fast Track scheme (see Annex 3 of the EIC Work Programme 2026). This scheme is managed by the funding body responsible for the existing project and applies to funding bodies listed in Annex 3 of the EIC Work Programme 2026. Applicants may also be able to apply if they have a project financed by an eligible programme managed by a Member State or an Associated Country under the pilot Plug-in scheme. The Plug-in scheme to apply to the EIC Accelerator is detailed in Annex 4 of the EIC Work Programme 2026. 2. Eligible Countries Described in Annex 2(B. Eligibility) of the EIC Work Programme 2026. Applicants from the United Kingdom can apply to the EIC Accelerator, but can only request and receive funding in the form of “grant only”. 3. Other Eligible Conditions Described in Annex 2(General conditions for proposals) of the EIC Work Programme 2026. 4. Financial and operational capacity and exclusion Described in Annex 2(C. Financial and Operational Capacity) of the EIC Work Programme 2026. 5a. Evaluation and award: Award criteria, scoring and thresholds Described in section IV of the EIC Work Programme 2026. 5b. Evaluation and award: Submission and evaluation processes Described in section IV of the EIC Work Programme 2026. 5c. Evaluation and award: Indicative timeline for evaluation and grant agreement Described in section IV of the EIC Work Programme 2026. 6. Legal and financial set-up of the grants Described in Annex G of the HE Main Work Programme 2023–2025 – 13. General Annexes. Specific conditions Described in Section IV.1, Section IV.2.3 and Section IV.2.4 of the EIC Work Programme 2026. Call Documents EIC Work Programme 2026 Application and evaluation forms and model grant agreement (MGA): Application form templates — the application form specific to this call is available in the Submission System Standard application form (HE EIC Accelerator stage 1 - short proposal) Standard application form (HE EIC Accelerator stage 2 - full proposal) Guidance