Kyiv City State
Administration
Kyiv
Investment
Agency
EN
UA
NOV
2025
The European Innovation Council invites participation in start-up support programmes in 2026
The European Innovation Council (EIC) has adopted its 2026 Work Programme, which aims to advance European ambitions in deep technologies and scaling. This document is important for strengthening Europe's innovation leadership and strategic autonomy in the field of technology. This was announced The European Innovation Council's programme is a document aligned with the EU's Strategy for Startups and Large Enterprises.
The European Innovation Council's Work Programme has published open calls for proposals for 2026 and details funding under five main schemes:
- EIC Pathfinder budget: €262 million for interdisciplinary research teams to conduct strategic research with the potential for technological breakthroughs (grants of up to €4 million).
- Transitional budget of the European Research Council (ERC): €100 million to transform research results into innovative opportunities related to the results obtained within the framework of the ERC Pathfinder project, the European Research Council's projects, Horizon Europe's second-level joint projects (societal challenges) and research infrastructure projects (grants of up to €2.5 million).
- Budgetary challenges in the field of cutting-edge innovation: a budget of €6 million to support high-risk, demand-driven deep technological innovations with transformative potential, particularly in areas where extensive research is being conducted but commercial implementation is lacking.
- EIC Accelerator (€634 million) for start-ups and SMEs to develop and scale up innovations with the potential to create new markets or disrupt existing ones (grants below €2.5 million, investments from €0.5 to €10 million).
- The EIC Strategic Technologies for Europe Platform (STEP) Scale Up (€300 million), which will provide additional equity funding to promising companies (SMEs, start-ups, spin-offs and small mid-caps) driving innovation in critical areas to help them secure larger private co-investment rounds of €50 million or above for further scaling their businesses (investments from €10 to €30 million).
The direct financial support to innovators is complemented with access to a wide range of Business Acceleration Services providing access to leading expertise, corporates, investors and ecosystem actors.
According to the European Innovation Council, the application process will be simplified starting in 2026, with the application form for full proposals being reduced from 50 to 20 pages and the evaluation period being shortened from six months to two months.
The 2026 work programme includes support for the implementation of a number of measures identified in the Start-up and Scale-up Strategy, in particular support for the European Corporate Network through the organisation of corporate success days, support for access to international markets and partners, and a gender index to track women's participation in the innovation ecosystem.
