FTTE faqs

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Frequent Asks and Questions

What is FTTE about?

The Focused Technology Transfer Experiments (FTTE) funding instrument, focusing on one of the four defined verticals (Digitized Transport, Digitized Agriculture, Digitized Environment and Digitized Anything), will give the opportunity to form synergies, accelerate product orient projects and offer guidance towards successful commercialisation. It will be of short-term duration (9 months) and will consist of cross-border Pathfinder Application Experiments (PAEs) between two different entities from two different eligible countries (as per the eligibility criteria stated in section 3 of the Guide for Applicants). Within these types of experiments, one party transfers to the receiving partner a specific Hardware (HW) or Software (SW) technology in order to enable improved product or processes.

Who can apply to the FTTE Open Call?

The SMART4ALL cross border Experiments have to be proposed by a Consortium including the following type of applicants:

• Universities and other Academic Institutions.
• SME and Slightly Bigger Companies, as defined in the EU recommendation 2003/361. Slightly Bigger Companies are defined respectively as organisations with a staff headcount below 500 employees and a turnover below EUR 100M.
• System Integrators and/or Technology Providers, i.e. any type of organisation specialised in technology transfer or system integration, serving the needs of end-users, provided they can be categorised in one of the two previous types of beneficiaries.

Proposals can be submitted by any of the aforementioned type of entities, but the participation of, at least, one SME/Slightly Bigger Company is compulsory and should be the lead of the cross-border Pathfinder Application Experiments (PAEs).

The PAEs must be cross‐border, involving at least two independent entities from two different eligible countries.

The applicants involved in the consortia can NOT include any SMART4ALL partners.

Can two academic entities apply to FTTE Open Call?

No, a Technology Provider and Technology Receiver shall apply together as a consortium through a simple application form. The consortium composition can be as follows:

How do I find a partner to apply with?

Through the SMART4ALL Matchmaking & Partner Search Serviceyou have access to SMART4ALL ecosystem for:

• Matchmaking among technological partners as well as between technological and business parties, based on specific requirements, offerings and characteristics
• Partner search for SMART4ALL Open Calls.

Can I apply if I am a collaborator of one of the partners of the SMART4ALL consortium?

No, applicants shall not have any actual or/and potential conflict of interest with the SMART4ALL selection process and during the whole internship program. All cases of conflict of interest will be assessed case by case.

What is the technology and verticals behind SMART4ALL?

SMART4ALL focuses on CLEC, i.e. low-energy computing technologies applied in four SMART4ALL verticals with European leadership and strategic importance, including but not limited to the following SMART4ALL competence fields (see summarised table below, the complete one being available in the Guide for Applicants):

	SMART4ALL VERTICALS
S M A R T 4 A L L C O M P E T E N C E	DIGITIZED TRANSPORT	DIGITIZED ENVIRONMENT	DIGITIZED AGRICULTURE	DIGITIZED ANYTHING
	1. Green Transport 2. Smart mobility 3. Shared mobility 4. Robotics 5. New platforms for efficient supply-demand matchmaking 6. Automotive electronics 7. Autonomous vehicles 8. Connected vehicles 9. Streamlining transport using big data 10. Aeronautics and space applications 11. Transport and Logistics 12. City Transport Mapping	1. Smartbuilding 2. Smarthome 3. Critical Infrastructure monitoring 4. Smart Hospitals 5. Water Polution monitoring 6. Smartgrids 7. Energy management 8. Environment monitoring 9. Bio-diversity 10. Wild/migratory animals monitoring 11. Smart industry 12. Data processing & data visualization	1. Smart farming 2. AI inspired agriculture 3. Information based site specific applications 4. Demand driven, sustainable agriculture 5. Mobile plant, soil and environment sensors 6. Sensor networks – EU wide – cross-border 7. Field robotics and automation systems 8. UAV based agriculture and plant monitoring 9. Selective plant protection 10. Closed nutrient cycles 11. Agricultural decision support systems 12. Zero-energy food systems 13. Circular economy 14. Water, Energy and Food (WEF) efficiency 15. Revalorisation of agricultural waste	1. Human-machine Interaction 2. Digital Education 3. Industrial Automation 4. Machine Learning 5. Market Intelligence 6. Medical and Health Applications 7. Active & Healthy Ageing 8. Support for disabled persons 9. Cybersecurity 10. Data Mining and Big Data 11. Personal security 12. Additive Manufacturing (3D printing) 13. Augmented and Virtual Reality 14. Audio/Video Processing 15. Location-based Technologies 16. Web and Mobile Applications 17. Wireless Sensor Networks 18. Disaster management 19. Digital heritage 20. Telemedicine 21. Rehabilitation, wellness, fitness 22. E-commerce

Can my consortium apply if my proposal is about CLEC but our competence field is not included in the previous list?

Yes, you can apply, provided your proposal is focused on CLEC and you can prove it deals with one of the four verticals. As mentioned in the introductory sentence, the above list does not pretend to limit the competence fields, it is just a guiding list.

What countries are eligible for SMART4ALL?

For this FTTE Open Call, the following countries will be eligible:

• The Member States of the European Union and its Overseas Countries and Territories (OCT) or
• Associated Countries to H2020
• The United Kingdom
• Any other South-East and Central Europe (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Hungary, Kosovo, Moldova, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia and Serbia) country not listed above but included in Annex A of the H2020 Work Programme

Additionally, since one of the goals of SMART4ALL is to support the digital transformation in mainly European countries underrepresented in European funding schemes, by means of cross-border experiments, consortia including at least one member from one of the SEE countries will be prioritized (except Greece) (see section 4 of the Guide for Applicants).

Can a consortium apply if the two entities are from the same eligible country?

No, FTTE and all the SMART4ALL experiment will be cross-border. In the case of FTTE, the two members of the applying consortia must be from two different countries within the list of eligible countries.

Can a consortium or a member of a consortium submit more than one proposal?

Any legal entity will be able to apply to the FTTE Open Call in as many consortia as wished, but it would only be selected as part of one consortium.

What does the application form to the FTTE Open Call include?

Proposals have to be submitted through the SMART4ALL microsite: https://smart4all.fundingbox.com

Applications submitted by any other means will not be considered for funding.

All Applicants will be asked to acknowledge the Informed consent form – in order to submit the full Application.

The proposals – submitted through the online platform – will include the following sections:

• Contact info
• Information on Partner no. 1:
• Information on Partner no. 2:
• FTTE key data
• Description of the FTTE
- (Scored) EXCELLENCE
- (Scored) IMPACT
- (Scored) IMPLEMENTATION
• Ethical issues, data protection and privacy
• Questions for statistical purposes
• Declaration of Honour and Absence of conflict of interest – acceptance
• Informed consent form – acceptance
• Processing of personal data – information clause acceptance

Additional material, which has not been included and specifically requested in the online application form, will not be considered for the evaluation of the proposals. Data not included in the proposal will not be taken into account. The SMART4ALL consortium makes its best effort to keep all provided data confidential; however, for the avoidance of doubt, the applicant is solely responsible to indicate its confidential information as such.

How long does it take to fill in the application?

In order to successfully fill in the application form you will probably need 1-2 days of writing, but we imagine that your team is composed of members specialized in their area of expertise you can divide and conquer. You’ll be able to add contributors to your application so that each team member can tackle their application area and you will be done quicker.

Considering specific character limits have been established in each section of the online application form, we encourage you to keep your application focused on the requested information keeping in mind the challenges and domains covered by this call.

We also recommend that you start the submission process quite before the deadline in order to avoid last minute circumstances.

When is the deadline for my application submission?

Applications must be submitted by the closing time and date published in the open call. Only proposals submitted before the deadline will be accepted. After the call closure no additions or changes to received proposals will be taken into account.

The deadline for this call is 15 September 2021 (17:00 CEST).

What is the selection process procedure and how long does it take?

The selection process is as follows:

Why is Cyprus not included in the SEE countries?

Cyprus typically is not a member of countries which belong to SEE region, this is something that can be changed to next calls.

Is it possible for the productizer and the academia/technology provider to cooperate to deliver the product?

Yes. In this case, it would be helpful to provide the basic principles of the envisioned IPR plan.

Does the Pilot need to include user testing or is thorough lab experiment with documented metrics also OK?

The starting point must be TRL5 or higher. So, according to the definition of TRL, specific validation activities must be performed in the field (even under specific assumptions). The definition of TRL levels is available at here

The ban on submission by a different laboratory of the same university concerns the participation in the FTTΕ or and in the KTE; or for both?

The conflict of interest refers to any SMART4ALL open call for all type of proposals i.e., KTEs, FTTEs & CTTEs.

What is the link of SMART4ALL YouTube channel?

The link of SMART4ALL YouTube channel is: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwmSl9LCl2vNBO-3k75dvJA

When it comes to VC funded companies or those that are negotiating with VC, why is this important for the application? Should it be stated somewhere how much money is raised and why?

This is not mandatory, but if you can provide this information, the evaluators can better understand your strategic position related to the submitted PAE.

The revenue model should be present for the productization partner only or also for the industrial technology transfer partner?

The PAE must include a go-to-market strategy (thus, a corresponding revenue model must be sketched). Of course, this is applicable only to the productization partner. The other partners must describe the added value gained from the PAE.

How to prove that partner and our company have experience?

There are no golden rules for this. The implementation part of the proposal must contain adequate information about what should be implemented and why the consortium contains the right mix of partners to achieve the technical objectives of the project.

Can the Productizer perform a productization for the Technology Receiver who will own the results and will actually use them on the market?

Yes. However, a clear go-to-market strategy (associated with an IPR plan) must be provided.

Can the technology Receiver be the only one bringing the product to the market?

Yes, this is possible.

Is it recommendable to connect with companies/academia via matchmaking or it doesn’t matter (any eligible SME or academia is equally fine for application)?

Concerning the use of matchmaking service, it is not mandatory to use it and is not related to the evaluation of a proposal. The matchmaking service is there just to help you.