EU-Wide Advantages and Opportunities of the EIC STEP Scale Up Call (HORIZON-EIC-2025-EICSTEP-01)

1. Single Market Access – 450+ Million Consumers

• Immediate eligibility in all 27 Member States and Associated Countries gives successful scale-ups a ‘passport’ to the world’s largest integrated market.

• Equity financing (10–30 M€) can underwrite simultaneous go-to-market activities (manufacturing, sales, after-sales service) in multiple EU jurisdictions without the need for separate national grant negotiations.

• Harmonised CE-marking, GDPR, REACH, MDR, etc. allow a single compliance effort to unlock revenue in every EU country, compressing time-to-scale by 12–24 months compared with a fragmented national approach.

2. Cross-Border Collaboration & Knowledge Exchange

• The STEP Seal automatically brands the company as an EU strategic-technology champion, attracting co-investors, corporates, and RTOs across borders.

• Business Acceleration Services (BAS) curate matchmaking with Deep-Tech Ecosystems:

• >400 EIT KIC partners

• 3 000+ Enterprise Europe Network (EEN) advisors

• 70+ European Innovation Council (EIC) portfolio peer companies

• Facilitates joint ventures and tech-transfer agreements that pool complementary IP from different Member States, qualifying for further support under IPCEIs, Chips Act pilot lines, or ERA industrial technology roadmaps.

3. Alignment with Key EU Policies

• European Green Deal: clean-tech investments (e.g. hydrogen, batteries, CCUS) gain accelerated permitting and access to Carbon Contracts for Difference.

• Digital Decade & Digital Europe Programme: AI, quantum, connectivity, and semiconductor projects align with EU’s 2030 Digital Targets and benefit from open testing facilities and sandboxes.

• Strategic Technologies for Europe Platform (STEP) & Chips Act: reinforces sovereignty objectives, improving priority access to EU fabs, pilot lines, and first-industrial-deployment vouchers.

4. Regulatory Harmonisation & IP Retention

• EIC Fund safeguards ensure the majority of value creation and IP remain in the EU, simplifying future freedom-to-operate analyses and reducing geopolitical supply-chain risk.

• A single equity agreement governed by Luxembourg law (standard EIC Fund structure) replaces 27 potential bilateral grant contracts, cutting legal costs by ~50 %.

5. Access to Europe’s Innovation Ecosystem

• Connection to 9 000+ Horizon Europe projects and 2 600 ERC Principal Investigators for follow-up clinical trials, field testing, or advanced prototyping.

• Preferential entry to European Digital Innovation Hubs (EDIHs) and Technology Infrastructures for scale-up validation, de-risking additional private capital.

• Visibility in EU Strategic Technology mapping portals, boosting talent attraction from Erasmus Mundus networks and pan-European doctoral schools.

6. Funding Synergies and Leverage ("Crowding-In")

• EIC Fund investment must catalyse 3–5× additional capital:

• InvestEU Venture Debt or Equity windows

• European Investment Bank (EIB) Growth Finance Facility

• Regional Smart Specialisation Funds (ERDF) for CAPEX or demo sites

• Innovation Fund (ETS) for large-scale clean-tech plants (>7,5 M€)

• CEF Digital & CEF Energy for infrastructure roll-out

• STEP Seal holders obtain privileged access to military-civil synergies (EDF, ASAP) and Horizon Europe Mission calls.

7. EU-Wide Scale and Impact

• Pan-European deployment reduces dependency on single national supply chains, supporting the Open Strategic Autonomy agenda.

• Market potential ≥150 M consumers for niche B2B applications and full 450 M for mass-market products, enabling revenue projections that justify unicorn-level valuations.

• Alignment with EU taxonomy and ESG disclosure rules eases entry to Sustainable Finance markets (Article 8 & 9 funds), broadening the investor pool.

8. Practical Actions for Applicants

1. Secure a qualified investor’s term-sheet covering ≥20 % of the target round before 16 Dec 2025.

2. Map your technology to STEP criticality criteria (innovation edge OR dependency reduction) and collect evidence (TRL, patents, market traction).

3. Prepare a freedom-to-operate & IP retention plan showing EU-based ownership and manufacturing.

4. Design cross-border pilots (at least two Member States) to reinforce the ‘European value’ narrative.

5. Identify complementary EU instruments (see Section 6) and outline a timeline for blended financing.

9. Strategic Value vs. National Funding

• Ticket sizes of up to 30 M€ in equity are rarely available at national level without heavy dilution; EIC Fund acts as a patient, minority shareholder.

• The EU label de-risks later Series C/D rounds led by international investors, as compliance with stringent EU due-diligence is already proven.

• Avoids “home-country bias” in procurement; STEP beneficiaries can bid for EU cross-border innovation procurement (PCP/PPI) with added credibility.

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Key Take-away: EIC STEP Scale Up provides high-impact, equity-only financing matched with unparalleled EU-wide strategic leverage—unlocking the full power of the Single Market, de-risking large cross-border rounds, and embedding the company at the centre of Europe’s sovereign-technology agenda.