What is Horizon 2020 or H2020?

The strategic objectives of H2020 are to drive economic growth and create more and better jobs. H2020 unleashes the innovation potential of organizations in EU member states and associated countries by means of funding high quality research projects for both public and private organizations.

The benefits of the program are access to high levels of funding for novel research and innovation projects for both public and private sector organizations. Organizations work together usually on collaborative based projects with partners from other countries. In addition projects get off the ground faster and achieve practically useful results quicker.

The funding program runs in parallel with the political life cycle of the European Commission and has been running from 2014 - 2020. There are still many calls for proposals still to be published all the way up until December 2020 when the program officially finishes. Its successor program Horizon Europe will officially commence in January 2021.

The first step is that an applicant organization needs to have a PIC code (Participant Identification Code) an innovative idea or proposal, your envisaged role and what calls for proposals you are planning to apply for. A DoA (Description of the Action) describing your proposal, partners involved, work packages and estimated budget is required. This is submitted to the Funding & Tender opportunities portal also called the Single Electronic Data Interchange Area (SEDIA)  where they will evaluated by external EC experts.

The program finances thousands of research and innovation projects every year in all thematic areas such as energy efficiency, climate change, transport, health, agriculture, the humanities and many more. The core vision is to transfer innovative solutions from the university, lab or research center to the market place and break down barriers between the public and private sectors by means of high quality international research collaborations.

We are targeting universities’, research centers, SMEs, larger companies, public bodies and foundations in Europe and all over the world. Participation in H2020 is open to every type of organization inside the EU but is also open to participation for organizations all over the world subject to conditions.