Open Call for Partnership: Strategic Topic Groups 2025

Beneficiary & submission

1. Proposal Submission Applicants must submit their proposals exclusively through the designated online application form available on the EIT Culture & Creativity platform. The submission window is open from 12 September 2025 to 13 October 2025 (17:00 CET). All proposals must be submitted before the deadline to be considered for evaluation. Late submissions will not be accepted. Applicants are requested to fill in the “Expression of Interest” form to receive the password to access the submission form. Only eligible lead partners can receive the password. Expression of Interest Link: Apply here Submission Link: Apply here 2. Admissibility and Eligibility Check Each proposal will first undergo an admissibility and eligibility check to ensure compliance with the call’s basic requirements: Admissibility Criteria: The proposal and all its attachments must be written entirely in English. The proposal must be submitted by the specified deadline. The proposal must be submitted through the designated application platform. The proposal must include all required documents, completed form sections, and annexes.In addition, each proposal must clearly include the three mandatory Work Packages (see Section 4.3 of the Call Guidelines) and the mandatory Deliverables (see Section 4.4) in its work plan. Proposals missing any of these elements will be considered inadmissible. Eligibility Criteria: Applicants must have a valid Participant Identification Code (PIC number). Applicants must be members of the EIT Culture & Creativity Partnership in 2025 holding the status of Core or Cooperation Partner only The partnership membership must be valid for 2025, ie the membership fee has been paid. Applicants and consortium members must comply with the applicant requirements as specified in the Call Guidelines. There is no requirement for co-funding, although it will be positively assessed. No specific EIT KPIs are directly applicable. However, the outputs of the call contribute indirectly to the EIT Impact Framework through policy insights, strategic positioning, and knowledge activation. Only proposals meeting both admissibility and eligibility criteria will proceed to the evaluation stage. 3. Quality Evaluation Process All proposals that pass the admissibility and eligibility checks will undergo a quality evaluation conducted by two independent External Experts and one Internal Expert against three criteria groups: Excellence: Expertise & knowledge development Impact: Societal & financial impact for the future Quality & Efficiency of Implementation  Each group of criteria has a maximum possible score and an associated threshold of 60%. Proposals must meet or exceed this threshold for each group to proceed to the next stage. 4. Ranking, Selection & Reserve List The final score of a proposal will be the simple arithmetic mean of the individual scores provided by all evaluators. This ensures consistency, equal treatment, and transparency across all proposals. Financial support will be awarded in strict ranking order based on the final scores, until the total EIT Culture & Creativity financial support budget is reached. The top-ranked proposals (up to eight, one per strategic topic) will be selected for EIT Culture & Creativity financial support. Proposals that pass all thresholds but are not selected due to budget limitations will be placed on a reserve list. The final financial support decisions for reserve list proposals will be communicated within a timeframe that allows for proper project implementation. 5. Communication of Results Applicants will be informed of the evaluation outcome via the official EIT Culture & Creativity communication channels.

Further information

For further information please check on the EIT website: Open Call for Partnership: Strategic Topic Group