EISMEA Call for proposals: Public procurement of innovation development

The purpose of the call is to enhance the internal market through public procurement of innovation that contributes to the transition towards a more competitive, digital, greener and social economy.

Objectives

The European Commission is seeking innovations that are not yet large scale commercially available but have that potential to be. To that end, this call seeks to encourage public buyers, who are ready to implement innovative technologies, to act as launching customers together with the supply side, particularly SMEs.

More specifically, the call intends to support proposals:

• that use public procurement as a tool to foster innovation in areas of strong public interest
• that have the potential to create a positive social impact, particularly in the areas of digital transformation, public health and green transformation

Successful proposals should contribute to capacity building and knowledge transfer on public procurement of innovation, increasing the number of procurers involved in the collaborative process and developing tools and knowledge for replication of the developed procurement of innovation.

Project budget

The available call budget is estimated at €4 000 000. The awarding authority plans to award two to three proposals.

Proposals must be submitted by a consortium of at least 2 applicants (beneficiaries; not affiliated entities) acting in their capacity of contracting authority (public buyer) which complies with the following conditions:
– minimum [2] public buyers from [2] different eligible countries that must effectively propose purchase of innovation. For the purpose of this Call, public buyer is to be understood as entity defined as
contracting authority under national public procurement provisions transposing the EU
public procurement Directives.

-Other conditions:

• Public buyers not procuring innovation can also apply as beneficiaries if covered by activities of capacity building/mentoring scheme/replication/dissemination and similar.
• Other legal entities can apply as beneficiaries – in particular entities supporting the core action of public procurement of innovation such as entities providing expertise on procurement of innovation to contracting authority, entities providing communication, dissemination, capacity building, training and similar expertise.

Grant

50% of the elegible total cost

Proposals must be submitted electronically via the Funding & Tenders Portal.