SMART call for advanced manufacturing projects

Participation

Participation is open to companies of all sizes, universities and research organisations.

By participating in a Cluster project, you benefit from:

• access to national R&D funding,
• an international network of companies including key industry players,
• guidance, coaching and monitoring of your project by [SMART] offices,
• low administrative requirements and
• receiving a quality label.

SMART is a flexible, industry-driven Eureka Cluster in advanced manufacturing. Its aim is to promote collaborative, international and close-to-market R&D and innovation projects.

For more details, visit SMART's website or contact the Cluster offices and your national funding body.

Scope

Your project should: 

• address at least one of the fields mentioned in the call description and
• demonstrate the potential to research or develop a product, process or service for commercialisation.

Relevant industry sectors include (but are not limited to):

• Aerospace
• Automotive
• Railway
• Consumer goods
• Capital goods
• Industrial components.

Advanced Manufacturing technologies to be researched and developed include (but are not limited to):

• Advanced manufacturing procceses
• Intelligent and adaptative manufacturing systems
• Digital, virtual and efficient companies
• Person-machine collaboration
• Sustainable manufacturing
• Customer-based manufacturing

Timeframe

• 21 September 2023: Call opens
• 23 November 2023: Project outline event
• 21 January 2024: Project outline submission deadline
• 5 March 2024: Announcement of successful project outlines
• 22 April 2024: Full project submission deadline
• 21 June 2024: Announcement of labelled projects

Eligibility

Eureka has limited eligibility criteria for organisations participating in a Clusters consortium:

• Your project idea must represent international cooperation in the form of a specific project.
• The project must be directed at researching or developing an innovative product, process or service with the goal of commercialisation.
• The project must have a civilian purpose.
• Your consortium must include at least two independent legal entities from a minimum of two Eureka countries.
• No single organisation or country can be responsible for more than 70% of the project budget.

This call for projects has additional criteria for organisations to be eligible to receive funding:

• Do you have a consortium comprised of at least 2 industrial companies from 2 different participating countries?
• Does your project have a civil purpose?
• Is your project innovative? Does it have a strong market orientation?
• Does every participant contribute with less than 66% of the overall project budget?
• Does every participating country contribute with less than 66% of the overall project budget?

If there is no allocated budget for your organisation type in your country and you want to participate in a project consortium, contact your national funding body to see whether there are other funding opportunities available or talk to them about self-funding.

Evaluation

Your project will be evaluated according to the following criteria:

1. Relevance to SMART

2. Quality and efficiency of the implementation – Project planning and consortium quality

• Quality of the consortium
• Added value through co-operation
• Realistic and clearly defined project management and planning
• Reasonable cost structure

3 Impact – Market and Commercialisation

• Market application and impact
• Market access and risk
• Competitive advantage
• Clear and realistic commercialisation plan

4 Contact with national funding bodies

The evaluation criteria have a different focus for project outlines and full project proposal evaluation.

For the project outline evaluation, the main focus is on the following criteria:

• Market application and impact
• Market access and risk
• Competitive advantage
• Clear and realistic commercialisation plan

In addition to the above-mentioned criteria, the following are taken into account for the full project proposal evaluation:

• Quality and efficiency of the implementation: Realistic and clearly defined project management and planning and reasonable cost structure
• Impact: Market application access and risk; clear and realistic commercialisation plans
• Excellence: New applied knowledge and technical achievability and risks
• Contact with national funding bodies

Applying

1. Contact your national funding body and SMART offices to discuss your project idea and eligibility.
2. Create an account on the SMART Cluster Projects Tool.
3. Submit your project outline (an overview of the project, its main objective, partnerships and expected impact) and receive feedback.
4. Submit your final project proposal.

Please note that your national funding body may have additional steps for applying for R&D funding.

Events and partner search

SMART will organise the following events, which offer opportunities for meeting potential project partners:

2023 SMART project outline Proposers’ Day, which will be held in person in Donostia, San Sebastián on 23 November.

SMART Proposers’ Day is a networking forum for organisations interested in participating in SMART projects and want to benefit from performing collaborative research. This forum will let you become part of the SMART future and jump-start your preparations for SMART project outline.

As a new feature, this year the project outline day will be held in conjunction with the MANUFuture Conference 2023, bringing together professionals from the industry and offering an enticing programme that we invite you to participate in.

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