Women TechEU
General Information
Opening date
01 August 2024
Deadline model
single-stage
Deadline dates
30 September 2024 17:00 (Brussels time)
Open For Submission
Expected duration of participation
–
Total funding available
3 000 000,00 €
Project acronym
Women TechEU
Full name of the EU funded project
Women Tech Europe Support Scheme
Grant agreement number
101133528
Topic
HORIZON-EIE-2023-CONNECT-01-01 – Organisation of the Women TechEU Scheme
Submission & evaluation process
The submission will happen through the official online submission platform, which is directly linked to the WomenTechEU website. Only applications received directly through the online submission platform will be considered eligible.
The submission process is supported by the following documents:
Guideline for applicants: all the information you need to know before applying.
Online Form: completed via Sploro platform and divided in six sections (1) Legal and Contact Information of the applicants (2) Impact section (3) Excellence section (4) Implementation (5) Ethics self-assessment (6) Declaration of Honour.
The evaluation process consists of three phases:
1.Eligibility check: A semi-automatic filter will consider 6 criteria that all applicants must comply with to be eligible.
2.Experts’ remote evaluation: The proposals that pass the eligibility check will move to the remote evaluation stage. Applications will be assessed by independent external expert evaluators with an entrepreneurial, investment or innovation background. Two evaluators, one with technical and another one with commercial business background, will assess the proposals based on 3 different evaluation criteria (Impact, Excellence, and Implementation).
3.Score normalisation: This method ensures a more balanced distribution of scores and reduces the possibility of biases and distortions. At the event that a divergence greater of 20% persists, the two evaluators will hold a consensus meeting.
Final Selection: All proposals are ranked based on their remote evaluation scores. In the event of a tie, a series of rules will be followed that will make it possible to reach a tiebreaker.
Prior to contracting the top ranked applicants, the consortium will seek the approval of European Innovation Council and SMEs Executive Agency (EISMEA), and the list of selected start-ups will be submitted to EISMEA for final screening.
For more detailed information, please consult the Guidelines of the call.
For any question about the process there is a general email address available at helpdesk@womentecheurope.eu Show less
Further information
The Women TechEU project is on a mission to ignite the potential of women-led early-stage start-ups in deep tech. 160 talented women entrepreneurs from all over the European Union and Horizon Europe associated countries will be receiving direct support. With 75k€ funding (Grant) and a personalized business development programme, the project will be paving the way for these innovators to shine as leaders in deep tech innovation across Europe.
During 2 years, the project will give out a total of 12 M€ in grants over 4 different competitive calls.
Each cohort of successful entrepreneurs will then also be invited to use the menu of business development services that will be provided over a period of 6 months. Constant contacts and checkups of the KPIs that will be jointly developed by the entrepreneurs and their coaches will ensure that there is a smooth ongoing scaleup of their businesses, in order to prepare the winners to eventually also apply for the EIC Accelerator scheme.
To be eligible as an applicant at Women TechEU, it is essential to understand certain key criteria that define the profile of a qualified beneficiary. Here are the key definitions that guide the selection of beneficiaries:
1. Established country: the applicant must be established in a EU Member State or Horizon Europe Associated Country*.
*List of Horizon Europe Associated Countries as published by the European Commission on the date of the deadline of the call.
2. Early-stage start-up:
• The applying legal entity must be registered and established in an EU Member State or a Horizon Europe Associated Country for at least six months at the
time of the submission.
• The ‘start-up’ should be compliant with the definition of SME, according to the EU definition of SMEs according to the EU recommendation 2003/361.
• Early-stage refers to the phase of start-up development generally preceding the rapid growth phase. As an indication, the following criteria will be considered, amongst other to define an early-stage start-up:
o Startups that have been established and operating for not more than 8 years counting backwards from deadline of the call date and,
o Startups that have raised limited funding (up to 1 M € in equity),
o Before reaching high fidelity Minimum Viable Product.
3. Women leadership: Women legally recognized as founders or co-founders of the company. The founder or co-founder of the company must also currently hold a top management position (CEO, CTO or equivalent) within the same company. It will be also required that women hold at least 25% of the shares in the CAP table (capitalization table) of the company at the moment of submission.
Important Note:
Women TechEU supports women in all their diversity. The word “woman” equates to a cis woman, or a transgender woman who is legally defined as a woman. The lead applicant of the submission must be a woman. The means of verification will be the Identity Card issued by the country of their nationality.
4. Deep tech: Deep tech innovation aims to provide concrete solutions to our societal problems by finding its source in a deep interaction with the most recent scientific and technological advances and by seeking to produce a profound impact in the targeted application areas.
Sectors, which are most fertile for deep tech applications are life-science, computing, food and agri-tech, aerospace, energy and clean-tech, industrial technologies, telecom, new materials, or chemistry. However deep tech also includes, among other, artificial intelligence, deep learning and machine learning. Women TechEU welcomes applications from all deep tech fields of activity.
5. Not previously funded for the same activities : neither the full application nor its proposed activities have benefited from any other EU Programme such as Women TechEU initiative or similar initiatives (ie: Horizon Europe – EmpoWomen).”
6. Not part of Women TechEU beneficiaries: Women TechEU consortium partners, their affiliated entities, employees, and subcontractors are not allowed to submit a proposal and therefore to receive any financial support through the open calls.