Financial Support to Submit a New ERC Grant Proposal

Approved research organisations, private companies, public sector bodies, organisations in the voluntary sector, and associations can apply.

You may apply for support even if your previous ERC application was sent from an organisations outside Norway.

See the list of approved research organisations and the definition of Public sector body

Requirements for the Project Owner

The organisation you are applying from is the project owner and must be listed as such in the application form. The organisation must have approved that you are submitting the application. This organisation must be the host organisation in your new ERC-application.

Requirements related to the Project Manager

You must have submitted an application to a Starting Grant (StG), Consolidator Grant (CoG) or Advanced Grant (AdG) call as a Principal Investigator (PI). The application must have advanced to stage two of the evaluation process without being awarded funding.

You must use the awarded funding to improve the basis for submitting a new grant proposal to the ERC. The funds can only cover costs incurred after the Research Council has received your application and before you submit a new application to the ERC. We may cover the following expenses:

• payroll costs for the PI in connection with the preparation of an improved ERC grant proposal. Please see our webpages: Rates for funding of researcher time in the university and university college sector and for health trusts, and Calculating payroll and indirect expenses.
• payroll costs for people who assist the PI in the work with a new application; these costs cannot constitute more than xx% of the support (tba);
• direct costs related to experiments, data collection and use of infrastructure intended to generate results that will strengthen the grant proposal;
• travel and conference-related expenses for the PI, including costs related to a research stay at another institution, when this will help to strengthen the grant proposal.

Prerequisites for support

You must submit a new application to the first or second relevant ERC-call after receiving the evaluation of the project that made it to stage two but did not receive funding. This means that you have to submit your second application to a deadline one or two years after the deadline for your first application.

The new application must satisfy all formal requirements. If you submitted the first proposal in response to a Starting Grant call and you no longer satisfy the requirements for time passed since the completion of a doctorate, you may submit the new proposal in response to a Consolidator Grant call. The same applies to the transition from a Consolidator Grant to an Advanced Grant.

Support awarded to research organisation should go to the organisation's non-economic activity, and as such does not constitute state aid. The Research Council presupposes that the necessary accounting separation is in place.

You may receive support even if your resubmission is to an ERC call belonging to the new Framework Programme, Horizon Europe (2021-2027). Norwegian participation in Horizon Europe must be formally adopted by the Norwegian Parliament, and this can only happen after all Horizon Europe legislations have been formalised by the EU. We consider it unlikely that Norway will not participate. However, should Norway not participate, we will have a discussion with your institution. We will then cover incurred expenses, but we may withdraw unused budget.

De minimis aid for enterprises

Funding to enterprises is given as "de minimis" aid. This means that the company can receive a maximum of EUR 200,000 over a three-year period.

The Research Council will, prior to any payment of "de minimis" aid, request a written confirmation and an overview of all other "de minimis" aid that the company has received during the last three financial years. For enterprises that are part of a group, as a general rule, the maximum limit applies to the group as a whole. See also the EU regulation on "de minimis" aid (Commission Regulation (EU) No 1407/2013).

More information about the state aid regulations.

The support will be disbursed in arrears and we will only cover costs documented in the organisation's accounting.

Once the ERC call is closed, we will ask your institution to submit a final report including the project accounts.

All reports must be submitted online, and must include the following attachments:

• confirmation of submission of the ERC grant proposal;
• a completed and signed “Project account report” documenting costs incurred during the project period. Time sheets and other documentation must be provided upon request but should not be attached.

In the indicated fields, you must provide the following information:

• primary and secondary objectives of the project: to submit a new grant proposal to the ERC by a stipulated deadline;
• project summary: a two to four-line description of the planned ERC project;
• project period: from the date of submission of this application for support to the date of submission of the new ERC grant proposal. If the exact deadline at the ERC is not known, please enter an estimated date.;
• the application and the attachments can be in Norwegian or in English, and;
• all attachments must be submitted in pdf-format.

Mandatory attachments

• a project description no longer than five pages using the designated template (found at the end of the call);
• "Evaluation result letter — Proposal rejection letter" from  "Head of Scientific Management Department" at the ERC Executive Agency. This is a 1 page letter. Do not attach the Evaluation Report from the ERC.

Applications that do not meet the above requirements will be rejected.
We will not review documents or websites linked to in the application, or any other attachments other than those specified above.

Application assessment criteria

• Does the applicant satisfy the formal eligibility requirements?
• Does the application contain the necessary information?
• Do the costs for which funding is sought comply with the guidelines for this call for proposals?

Applications will be processed by the Research Council administration.

The application processing takes two to five weeks.