Library FAQ
What is the EIC Pathfinder and how much has it funded?
The Pathfinder supports breakthrough deep tech collaborative research projects and has provided over EUR 1.5 billion of funding since 2014.
What is the EIC Transition instrument and what has it funded?
Introduced in 2021, EIC Transition helps researchers and SMEs exploit deep tech results, mature technology and develop business plans; the first Transition calls under Horizon Europe awarded EUR 45 million.
What is the purpose of the Innovation Procurement Partnership Programme?
It connects EIC innovators with public and private buyers; beneficiaries have met over 100 procurers and 5% of SMEs have sealed a business deal within 12 months of such events.
What measurable meeting and deal impacts has the EIC Business Acceleration support achieved?
Meetings have been organised with 100+ corporates, 100+ public and private buyers, 400 investors, and 40+ accelerators/incubators/venture builders, resulting in 77 deals signed and 496 follow-on discussions.
What opportunity did the EIC have at the Florida International Medical Expo (FIME)?
The EIC participated in the Overseas Trade Fairs European Pavilion at FIME, which enabled meeting EIC counterparts, promoting to the US market, and receiving extensive personalised matchmaking services and coaching on investor decks.
What progress has the EIC made on female-led participation?
In 2020–2021, 20% of companies funded by the EIC Accelerator were female‑led; 24% of EIC Pathfinder projects were female‑led, with over 30% of researchers female.
What research outputs and IP results has the Pathfinder produced?
Pathfinder projects have resulted in 100 awards of intellectual property rights, 7 010 publications (including 5 200 in peer‑reviewed journals), and 3 121 publications in high‑impact journals.
What top measures are used by beneficiaries to reduce emissions?
Top measures include promoting public transport and carpooling (20%), avoiding flight travel (17%), promoting active and short‑distance mobility (14%), communicating on carbon footprint (13%), and changing lights to LED (12%).
What was the EIC–CaixaBank initiative in agritech?
The EIC, CaixaBank and AgroBank ran an Innovation Procurement pilot to offer EIC-funded agritech companies market access and support rural development; ten selected companies were given access to the market using the bank’s commercial and financial know‑how.
How could bio-inspired AI matter for Europe’s resilience and strategic autonomy?
By improving learning efficiency, adaptability and transparency, bio-inspired AI can reduce dependence on resource‑intensive models developed outside Europe, align with Trustworthy AI and the AI Act, and support sovereign AI pathways—while necessitating advanc...
How could embodied AI affect Europe’s resilience and strategic autonomy?
Control over simulation and environment platforms is strategically important; European capabilities in environment-centric training, evaluation infrastructures and embodied learning can reduce reliance on externally controlled platforms and ensure appropriate...
How could graphene materials affect Europe’s space resilience and autonomy?
Graphene can improve mass efficiency, thermal performance and multifunctionality of space subsystems, supporting EU space and connectivity objectives and reducing reliance on non‑EU sources, but broader deployment requires standardisation, certification, workf...
How does edge computing in space contribute to Europe’s resilience and strategic autonomy?
Onboard processing reduces dependence on continuous ground control, supporting loss‑tolerant operations, space safety and debris mitigation consistent with the EU Space Programme and Space Strategy for Security and Defence, while raising verification and respo...
How do Zero Trust AI architectures support Europe’s resilience and strategic autonomy?
They address data sovereignty and cybersecurity priorities by enabling distributed training and inference without centralising data, aligning with the AI Act and EU Cybersecurity frameworks, strengthening hardware-anchored security and post-quantum protection,...
What are Embedded Zero Trust Architectures for distributed and federated AI systems?
Distributed Zero Trust Architecture (ZTA) for AI enables decentralised training and inference infrastructures in which no component is assumed trusted. It functions as a secured AI execution fabric that uses continuous verification and dynamic prevention, dete...
What are graphene-based coatings and composites for space systems?
Graphene-based materials (single-atom-thick carbon) can be used as thin films, coatings, fillers or multilayer composites in spacecraft to provide high mechanical strength, exceptional electrical and thermal conductivity, barrier and tribological properties, a...
What is bio-inspired AI?
Bio-inspired AI draws on neuroscience, cognitive science and evolutionary biology to implement mechanisms such as hierarchical and distributed processing, synaptic plasticity, structural diversity and adaptive information encoding to produce more adaptable, ro...
What is edge computing for scalable and loss‑tolerant satellite operations?
Edge computing in space means processing data onboard satellites or orbital platforms rather than transmitting raw data to ground. It filters, classifies and prioritises information at source, supports onboard decision‑making and coordination, and mitigates co...
What is embodied AI for open and dynamic environments?
Embodied AI couples perception, internal priors and physical or simulated actuation within rich, open-ended settings (3D virtual worlds, physics simulations, digital twins). It combines scalable priors, environments exposing physical action costs and explicit...
What is new about edge computing in space?
Edge computing is shifting from optional pre‑processing to mission‑ and safety‑relevant autonomy at scale, enabling onboard functions such as image classification, anomaly detection, collision assessment and constellation coordination without waiting for groun...
What is novel about integrating Zero Trust principles into AI infrastructures?
The novelty is embedding isolation, attestation and encryption directly into semiconductor, system and orchestration layers (for example within AI accelerators), plus distributed post-quantum key management and adaptations to models, runtimes and orchestration...
What recent advances distinguish modern bio-inspired AI from earlier biologically inspired models?
Recent advances translate biological principles into formal, implementable mechanisms (e.g., Free Energy Principle), use evolutionary algorithms and neural architecture search for structural diversity, develop learned temporal representations via interaction a...
What recent developments are changing embodied AI research?
There is a shift from narrow benchmarks to environment and action-space design that supports general adaptive competence, use of large multimodal or learned world‑model priors adapted online, hierarchical memory (short-term and episodic skill representations),...
What recent progress enables graphene integration into space systems?
Advances in production methods (liquid phase exfoliation, chemical vapour deposition, mechanical exfoliation) and maturing European supply through coordinated research and industrialisation (e.g., Graphene Flagship) are making system‑level integration and qual...