Eureka Eurostars is the largest international funding programme for SMEs collaborating on R&D-projects to create innovative products, processes or services. Eurostars is funding technological and business development and thus boosts the internationalisation of SMEs. From 2014 till 2020 Eurostars 2 was in place. Eurostars 2 has now been evaluated, we have summarised some statistics:

Eurostars 2 evaluation results

As many as 5,891 projects were submitted between 2014 and 2020. And a total of 1,546 projects were funded within the Eurostars-2 programme and were positively evaluated by beneficiaries and national funding agencies. Most participants of these projects, 66% in total, were R&D-performing SMEs and SMEs (SMEs are always the project leaders). The other project participants were: 15% universities, 9% research institutes and 6% large companies. The average number of costs in a project have been around 1.4 Million Euro and the average success rate of the Eurostars 2 was 27%. An average of 103 projects were funded per cut-off date.

The following countries had the highest success rate in Eurostars 2:

• The Netherlands;
• Switzerland;
• Belgium;
• Israel;
• Germany.

Number of participants per country:

Most participants came from Germany (779), followed by the Netherlands (603), Switzerland (492), Denmark (434) and Sweden (348).

Image 1: overview of participants in the Eurostars 2 programme per country (source: Publications Office of the European Union)

The countries with the highest national budget:

• Germany: 112M;
• The Netherlands: 102M;
• France: 74M;
• Sweden: 71M;
• Norway: 59M;
• Spain: 53M.

Markets addressed by Eurostars-2 projects:

Different technological areas were addressed. But with 38%, ‘medical/ health related’ was the far most common topic within Eurostars 2 projects.

Image 2: markets addressed by Eurostars 2 (source: Publications Office of the European Union)

For those who don’t know: what is Eurostars?

Eurostars is an important grant for SMEs interested in collaborating on R&D projects aimed at innovating products, processes or services. To be eligible, your project:

• Is led by an innovative SME from a Eurostars country;
• Lasts up to 36 months;
• Has an exclusive focus on civil applications;

In addition you must meet the following criteria:

• The consortium consists of at least 2 independent entities;
• The consuortium consists of at least 2 Eurostars countries;
• At least 50% of the project’s budget is carried out by the SME;
• No participant or country is responsible for more than 70% of the project costs.

Apply for Eurostars call 5

The fifth Eurostars call is open from 14 July to 14 September 2023. Eurostars offers a maximum of € 500.000 per project. Project partners can receive 40% or 50% of their total R&D-costs:

• SME’s: 50%
• Research organisations or universities: 50%
• Large company and other participants: 40%

Extensive experience in Eurostars applications

Hezelburcht has a lot of knowledge and experience in Eurostars. Do you have any questions or would you like to receive more information about Eurostars? Our specialists are happy to advice you! Contact us.

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