The “Application of green industry innovation and ICT products and technologies” open call for proposals supports small and medium-sized enterprises to purchase new equipment to implement products and technologies with a reduced environmental impact, or ICT products that enable digitalization in the production process. The project should lead to a new product being introduced into production. The co-financing will not only be provided for the purchase of equipment, but also for research and development activities.
Support per project ranges from EUR 200,000 to EUR 600,000 with an aid intensity of:
Project activities to be supported by the “Application of green industry innovation and ICT products and technologies” open call for proposals:
Within the programme, a new product is a good or service that meets one of the levels of innovation:
To qualify for co-financing, a project applicant must, at the time of being granted aid, meet the following requirements:
If an applicant is granted aid under Commission Regulation No. 651/2014 (other than de minimis aid), then in addition to the requirements set out above, an applicant who does not qualify as a enterprise in difficulty (as defined in Article 2(18) of Commission Regulation No. 651/2014) at the time that the aid is granted, can also qualify for co-financing.
As part of the open call for proposals, a project can be submitted in cooperation with a project partner that can be any public or private body, commercial or non-commercial and non-governmental organisation registered as a legal entity in the Kingdom of Norway or the Republic of Latvia. If the applicant has a partner from the donor country (Norway), this criterion will grant extra points. The project partner and applicant will work together within the framework of the project, and the partner will share best practices in the development of a specific product and/or technology, knowledge in product/technology development, and perform product/technology development activities (such as reduction of environmental indicators) to develop a variety of possible scenarios related to the development of the new product/technology in order to achieve the project objectives.
The project should lead to a new product being introduced into production. In addition, the person implementing the project will ensure that at least one new full-time job is created, which is directly linked to the implementation of the open call project.
Open call project activities and costs are eligible if:
The objective of the open call for proposals is to increase of productivity and competitiveness of merchants by introducing new products and technologies in production.
The project should lead to the introduction of a new product into production.
As part of the understanding of the regulation project of the planning period programme, the 2014-2021 period “Entrepreneurship Development, Innovations and Small and Medium Enterprises” of the Norwegian Financial Mechanism, a new product is a good or service that meets one of the levels of innovation:
The Programme is regulated by Cabinet of Ministers Regulation No. 4 “Rules for the Implementation of the Norwegian Financial Mechanism Programme of the 2014-2014 period “Entrepreneurship Development, Innovations and Small and Medium Enterprises”” (adopted on 7 January 2021).
Documents related to the open call for project applications and other annexes can be found at eeagrants.lv.