Programme INNOSUP Innovation Associate

SMEs encounter multiple challenges over their life cycle. They are often unable to access skills and knowledge and they experience more obstacles when having to recruit specialised professionals. 

This is where the INNOSUP Innovation Associate programme comes into play. The programme provides grants at European level to SMEs to employ a highly-skilled researcher – the ‘innovation associate' – for a continuous period of one year. The associate's task will be to turn the SME’s innovative idea into an innovation project.

Expected Impact:

• Test that an innovative idea can feed into an innovation strategy and can lead to subsequent research and innovation projects once SMEs have access to the right skills;
• Test that public intervention at European level can support innovating SMEs to overcome challenges in accessing scarce skills through a transnational mobility mechanism;
• Increased innovation capacity for SMEs, including increased participation in R&I projects and staff employed in R&I;
• Increased awareness as well as skills of researchers in innovation management and business environment, through the placement and training.

SMEs that have received a subsidy for this action on the occasion of previous calls for the European partner pilot for SME innovation in the 2016-2017 and 2018-2020 work programs are not eligible.

The new call for the INNOSUP Innovation associate programme is now open until 15 January 2020.

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