EIC Innovation Procurement Programme: Scaling up Europe’s top-notch innovators

Public procurement accounts for more than 2 trillion Euros or 14% of the EU GDP at annual basis^[1]. This figure is increasing significantly if we add also the budget that is spent in the private sector through procurement. 

Innovation procurement is one of the main tools to increase competitiveness of the European economy, helping at the same time the modernisation of the offered services and providing concrete business opportunities to innovative SMEs and start-ups.  

The importance of innovation procurement has been also stressed by the recent studies on the reinforcement of the EU competitiveness such as the Draghi report and the Letta report.

To that end, the EIC has put in place the EIC BAS Innovation Procurement programme, an ambitious initiative that aims at supporting the scaling up of the EIC top-notch innovators by facilitating their access to procurement markets in Europe and at a global level.

Powered by the EIC Business Acceleration Services, the EIC Innovation Procurement programme is an end-to-end programme that also supports the demand side of its services by purchasing through procurement cutting-edge solutions developed by EIC beneficiaries. 

The structure of this programme is based on three key points:

• Contacts between the EIC beneficiaries and potential buyers
• Skills enhancement of the EIC beneficiaries to access procurement markets in Europe and at a global level
• Contracts, notably new businesses.

The EIC Innovation Procurement Programme is divided into three initiatives: SPIN4EIC  Strategic Use of Innovation Procurement, InnoMatch and InnoBuyer.

SPIN4EIC: Strategic Use of Innovation Procurement

SPIN4EIC is a unique initiative powered by the EIC Innovation Procurement programme, providing unparalleled support services to EIC-backed innovators. This programme is designed to amplify their ability to access innovation procurement markets across Europe and globally. By championing the entry of top-tier EIC innovators into these markets, SPIN4EIC opens significant opportunities, supporting their growth and connecting them with procurers.

SPIN4EIC also extends its offer to public buyers, empowering them to elevate their procurement strategies with services tailored to foster innovation.

The main goals of the SPIN4EIC initiative are:

• Creating a community of public and private buyers interested in the solutions offered by EIC Beneficiaries;
• Enhancing the capacity of public buyers to purchase innovative solutions to tackle public challenges, opening at the same time their procurement markets to SMEs and start-ups;
• Providing assistance to EIC beneficiaries to submit tenders in public and private sector procurement opportunities in Europe and globally;
• Enhancing the capacity of EIC beneficiaries to find business opportunities through procurement, and take part as potential suppliers in bids in Europe as well as in non-EU countries (through actions such as Innovation Procurement Academies, the EIC toolkit on Innovation Procurement, etc.).

More specifically, the SPIN4EIC initiative provides the following support:

• Innovation Procurement Academies dedicated to EIC beneficiaries: Offering free high-quality knowledge and practical online training to understand how to leverage innovation procurement from a supplier’s perspective, supplying innovation to both public and private buyers within Europe and beyond. The next Academy will take place fully online between 14 and 17 October, secure your spot here!
• Tailored assistance to EIC beneficiaries: EIC beneficiaries will be supported to take part as bidders in public services, including those in the research and development (R&D) fields, and private sector innovation procurement tender processes in and outside Europe. This is a free service for EIC beneficiaries. An Ongoing call is open until August 2026 and specific sub-calls are also launched based on available procurement opportunities.
• Assistance dedicated to public buyers: Public buyers can receive free assistance to design and implement their innovation procurement projects through an ongoing call. Moreover, through eight calls for applications, public buyers can apply for and receive tailored assistance in key areas such as needs assessment, business case development, market consultation and drafting tender documents.
• Pitching events: Bringing together key EIC innovators and buyers with pitching sessions and matchmaking corners, the events aim to build strong relationships between EIC innovators and buyers, fostering collaboration and driving innovation in public procurement.
• EIC Toolkit on Innovation Procurement: An easy-to-use EIC Innovation Procurement online toolkit focused on the needs of EIC-backed SMEs and start-ups, aiming at enhancing their capacity to access procurement markets as potential suppliers.

If you want to stay updated with all the opportunities offered by the initiative, visit our webpage and discover the SPIN4EIC Community that is one of the cornerstones of the EIC Innovation Procurement programme. It’s a virtual place where you can network with EIC innovators and buyers and find information about services, events and other opportunities! Additionally, you can also subscribe to our Newsletter to receive all the relevant news about the EIC Innovation Procurement programme or contact us directly though the Helpdesk for any questions.  

InnoMatch: Propelling EIC innovations with proof-of-concept demonstrations and pilot testing  

Aiming at mainstreaming innovation procurement in Europe, InnoMatch is complementing the holistic approach of the EIC Innovation Procurement programme by supporting the proof-of-concept demonstration or pilot testing of EIC innovations to solve unmet needs of selected public or private procurement customers. In this context, 2.28M EUR will be offered to support 38 pilots, covering up to 60K EUR per pilot. Innomatch will be implemented over 36 months, starting from September 1st, 2024.

InnoMatch aims to:

• Recruit and engage private and public buyers to participate in an innovation demand-driven programme.
• Setup, deploy and assess a competitive, transparent and fair open call framework to select EIC beneficiaries with the potential to deploy innovative solutions in co-creation with committed buyers.
• Implement a programme to support the pilot’s deployment and increase chances that the successfully piloted solutions are adopted by multiple buyers after co-creation.
• Establish synergies with projects, networks, initiatives, and relevant stakeholders to increase visibility and promotion of the project, the innovative start-ups and their customers.

For this purpose, InnoMatch will launch three types of open calls to recruit both buyers (public and private customers of innovative solutions) and ‘EICs’ (innovative start-ups that are EIC beneficiaries):

• Open call for ‘EICs’ and buyers: An EIC beneficiary applies together with a buyer, presenting an innovative solution answering to a specific buyer’s need. There are two waves of this type of open call.
• Open call for Buyers: The buyers apply with their unmet need. The open call is structured around the five topics of SPIN4EIC, thus aiming to leverage its efforts to support EIC beneficiaries to scale and grow their business by providing them open procurement market opportunities. InnoMatch will help the buyers to polish their ideas and will group the unmet needs into challenges. There is only one cohort under this type.
• Open call for ‘EICs’ (EIC beneficiaries): To provide a solution to the unmet needs selected in the call for buyers, EIC beneficiaries (‘EICs’) propose competing solutions, with only one being awarded per challenge.

The first wave of the open call for ‘EICs’ and buyers will be launched in January 2025, along with the call for buyers. To stay updated visit the SPIN4EIC webpage or subscribe to the Innovation Procurement Newsletter.

InnoBuyer: Bringing innovative solutions to common challenges  

Powered by the EIC Innovation Procurement programme, InnoBuyer is supporting the implementation of a demand-driven methodology bringing together procurers (Challengers) and innovation suppliers (Solvers, notably EIC-backed SMEs) to jointly co-create solutions to common challenges proposed by procurers, while also facilitating the procurers’ adoption and the innovation suppliers’ commercialisation of the solutions.

The programme’s goals are to:

• Foster the development of an ecosystem of collaborative innovation between the best European public and private procurers and innovation suppliers (in particular, EIC-supported companies).
• Launch and validate a support programme to co-create innovation between Challengers and Solvers. The programme is demand-driven and geared to adoption by design.
• Demonstrate the increase of efficiency of EU public (but also private) services by piloting 16 innovative solutions, including the ones from the EIC-funded companies.

Our methodology is composed of four distinct actions:

• Action 1 - Recruitment and aggregation of procurers: The InnoBuyer consortium recruites unmet needs from procurers and selects the best candidates. Other interested public and private procurers are aggregated to the selected challenge to acquire knowledge along the project.
• Action 2 - Buyer-SME matching: Buyers are supported to launch an open market consultation to receive feedback on their challenges. Then, they recruit and award suppliers to answer the proposed challenges.
• Action 3 - Pilot co-creation: Challengers and Solvers are jointly co-creating solutions to the challenges. The innovative solutions will be tested and evaluated, and Solvers will receive support towards future commercialisation of their solutions.
• Action 4 - Terms of Reference (ToRs) delivery: Support the creation of ToRs in collaboration with external experts as the base for a future tender for the solution by the Challengers.

The first cohort of Challenger/Solver duos is now halfway through the pilot co-creation phase (Action 3). Detailed information about each of the selected duos is available on the InnoBuyer website. The second cohort, consisting solely of EIC Solvers and their respective Challengers, will soon begin Action 3.

To learn more about the project and our pilot actions, follow us on social media, subscribe to our newsletter, or contact us via email.