Ireland ranked 5th in most competitive EIC Accelerator call to date in Horizon Europe.
Four Enterprise Ireland-backed companies have been recommended for €23m funding from the March 2022 call of the European Innovation Council (EIC) Accelerator Programme.
The four successful Irish companies are: InVera Medical and Loci Orthopaedics, both based in Galway, Selio Medical based in Dublin and Ovagen, based in Mayo.
“Ireland is a world-leading location to start and scale a business”
The EIC Accelerator Programme provides transformational funding to high-potential, high-risk start-ups, scale ups and SMEs led by a strong, well-balanced leadership team which are already making good progress in commercialising highly differentiated, deeptech products capable of creating new markets or disrupting existing ones.
World class ecosystem
Part of the EU’s Horizon Europe 2021-2027 Research and Innovation Programme, the EIC Accelerator Programme provides grant funding of up to €2.5m combined with an equity investment ranging from €0.5 to €15m in a blended finance offer. There are usually a number of all sector calls and parallel challenge or thematic-based calls per year.
This was the most competitive EIC Accelerator call to date with 74 companies from 18 European countries selected by panels of experienced investors and entrepreneurs to receive €382m in funding. There was a total of 1,093 applicants, 266 of which were shortlisted for the interview phase. The call had a 7% success rate.
In this funding round Ireland ranked fifth with only start-ups and SMEs from Germany, France, Finland, and the Netherlands ranked above Ireland based on the value of funding recommended in this EIC round.
All four of the Irish start-ups are High Potential Start-Ups (HPSU) or sector clients of Enterprise Ireland.
InVera Medical, Loci Orthopaedics and Selio Medical are third level spin-outs that were previously supported by Enterprise Ireland’s Commercialisation Fund and the BioInnovate Ireland Programme, which Enterprise Ireland also supports and works closely with.
“This is a great achievement by the four companies involved,” said Enterprise Ireland CEO Leo Clancy.
“Our EIC Accelerator activities align very well with ambitions we’ve laid out in our new three-year strategy ‘Leading in a Changing world’ that Ireland is a world-leading location to start and scale a business and that we support our clients to access scaling finance at critical points in their company development journey. Their success is a reflection of the hands on support they receive at different stages of their journey from our research commercialisation, EIC, HPSU and sector teams.”
Main image (from left): Colm McGarvey CEO and Co-Founder Selio Medical; Fiona Mangan, design engineer, Loci Orthopaedics; Leo Clancy, CEO, Enterprise Ireland; Dr. Catherine Caulfield, CEO and co-founder Ovagen; Stephen Cox, CEO and co-founder Invera Medical; and Sean Burke, National Delegate and National Contact Point for EIC Programme.
