If you are a

  • cluster organisations
  • technology centres
  • SMEs

and you have a project that contributes to the following objectives, you can apply for the EU Call for the establisment of strategic alliances by SMEs.

The objectives of the project are:

  • To explore cooperation opportunities between different type of EU businesses, particularly tech-savvy SMEs and traditional SMEs, with the aim of improving industrial competences, increasing resilience and adding value to existing industrial sectors and value chains.
  • To increase the adoption of advanced technologies in traditional SMEs and help EU tech-savvy SMEs that developed critical technology applications to expand their market potential in the EU.
  • To exploit the potential of dynamic cooperation between the cluster organisations and their technology centres.
  • To develop businesses cooperation between different clusters from the same industrial ecosystem and create partnerships with other relevant industrial ecosystems.

The project should last 24 months and among the eligible activities there are:

a) Preparatory mandatory activities, for the building of SME alliances and businesses adoption of new technologies.

b) Core mandatory activities, such as building strategic alliances between traditional SMEs; supporting the established strategic alliances in bridging with EU tech-savvy SMEs; organising and managing at least one virtual match-making event; organising technical assistance, provided by technology centres; providing business support for the adaptation of the technologies to the SMEs in their cluster; identifying opportunities and threats SMEs face while they intend to adopt advanced technologies and provide appropriate industrial policy recommendations; organising the necessary communication and dissemination activities to first mobilise EU traditional and tech-savvy SMEs, and then share best practices with other cluster organisations and technology centres.

c) Complementary mandatory activities, such as mapping critical technological companies, drafting and promoting a “guidelines and lessons learned” report on how clusters and technology centres could provide better technical assistance and business support to those SMEs aiming to adopt advanced technologies; drafting and promoting a report on a series of policy recommendations to the EU Member States and regions on strategic technological autonomy; to organise at least two peer review meetings to share experiences, learnings and results.