The funding is provided under Phase 1 of the instrument, which means that each project will receive €50 000 to finance feasibility studies for new products that can disrupt the market. They can also ask for up to three days of free business coaching.

In this first round in 2017, the European Commission received 2111 proposals by the cut-off date of 15 February. The 184 SMEs selected for funding proposed 178 projects in total (multiple SMEs can be involved in one project).

Most of the projects funded were in the area of ICT (36). It was closely followed by low-carbon and efficient energy systems (31) and transport (28). Italian SMEs were particularly successful with 37 beneficiaries accepted for funding, followed by firms from Spain (33) and the UK (16).

In the Western Balkans, 3 SMEs from Serbia were selected for funding:

-   Company for Design Engineering Consulting and Business Services for ELG-BLocks, boosting the potential of small businesses in the areas of climate action, environment, resource efficiency and raw materials;

-   Swiftty D.O.O. for SwiftBuild, in the field of open disruptive innovation;

-   Myskin Doo Beograd for Scanz, Digital acne assesment tool enabling acne diagnosis in cost and time efficient way;

Since the launch of the programme on 1 January 2014, 2208 SMEs have been selected under Phase 1 of the SME Instrument.

The next cut-off for Phase 1 is 3 May 2017.

More informations

List of selected Projects

Map of beneficiaries

Source: EC