Background Total budget of the call: EUR 10.000.000
The ERC Proof of concept grant aims at supporting an ERC grant-holder during the predemonstration phase to prepare a "package" to be presented to venture capitalists or companies that might invest in its technology and take it through the early commercialisation phase.
The aim is that of conducting a proof of concept of an idea that was generated in the course of the ERC-funded project, i.e. to undertake further work to verify whether, in principle, this idea has near term market potential. This would help:
- establishing viability, technical issues and overall direction
- clarifying IPR position and strategy
- providing feedback for budgeting and other forms of commercial discussion
- providing connections to later stage funding
- covering initial expenses for establishing a company
Eligibility
- Eligible Principal Investigator: All Principal Investigators benefitting from an ERC frontier research grant, that is either ongoing or where
the project has ended less than 12 months before the publication date of this call, are eligible to participate and apply for an ERC Proof
of Concept Grant.
- Eligible Host Institution (Applicant Legal Entity): The host institution must engage the Principal Investigator for at least the duration of the
proof of concept activity and must be established in a Member State or an Associated Country. It may also be an International European
Interest Organisation (such as CERN, EMBL, etc.), the European Commission's Joint Research Centre (JRC), or an entity created under EU
law. Any type of legal entity, public or private, including universities, research organisations as well as undertakings can host the Principal
Investigator and his/her team. The financial contribution will be up to a maximum of EUR 150 000 for a period of 12
months.
Budget
- The indicative budget for this call for 2013 is EUR 10 000 000 (approximately half of which will be for each of the two evaluation rounds
following two specific deadlines).
- Grants up to 150.000€ for a duration of 12 months.
Deadline: 24 April 2013 and 03 October 2013