The whole world is currently dealing with a novel coronavirus pandemic and we all want to try to understand what the future may hold. Using computer-based models would allow us to keep up with the spread and evolution of the pandemic.

Last week the European Innovation Council Business Acceleration Services launched its Planet.tech challenge, a new initiative under its Corporate Partnership Programme. In the upcoming days, we will highlight the different challenges and introduce you to the corporates involved. First up is Nestlé. The Swiss multinational food and drink company is going green, clean and committed to ensure a healthier future. This week Nestlé added new challenges to Planet.Tech. Do you want to know more? It’s time to feed your curiosity.

The European Commission is launching an initiative to collect ideas about deployable Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Robotics solutions as well as information on other initiatives that could help face the ongoing COVID-19 crisis.

Are you a Deep tech startup with seed funding, willing to accelerate the company and have access to free coaching from experts and peers? InvestHorizon is looking to identify ambitious entrepreneurs and help them through coaching, mentoring and pitching events to scale their business and raise funding. The next deadline for applications is 20 May 2020.

Maurizio Aiello is an innovator, the CEO of the biotechnology company, React4life that helps scientists in the field of cancer research. He has been involved in several EU-funded projects: B2B, a Future and Emerging Technologies (FET) project and MOOD, which benefited from the European Innovation Council (EIC) Accelerator. In this interview, Maurizio talks about his career path, the challenges that start-up companies are facing with and his personal experience about how bold ideas can be turn into reality by the help of the European Commission in order to improve therapeutic methods and the life expectancy of oncologic patients.

The Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI) is launching a fast-track call for proposals on the development of therapeutics and diagnostics to tackle current and future Coronavirus outbreaks. The call has a budget of EUR 45 million from the EU’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme. The funding can support projects of organisations such as universities and small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

The EIC and EBAN are pleased to invite all eligible startups to participate in our fifth joint EIC/EBAN eHealth Scaleup of the Month Webinar - an initiative designed to give visibility to the best EIC companies that are raising follow-on investments to scale. This edition will focus on eHealth companies and will take place on 29 April 2020, 1 pm CET - so mark your calendars already!

Lights, camera, action! The largest and most important cinema trade show in Europe is back, from 22 to 25 June, in Barcelona. CineEurope 2020 is expecting 3.500 industry representatives from distribution and exhibition to technology and concessions. Apply here if you want to break into Europe’s major exhibitors’ convention and present your products in the EU-supported stand at CineEurope 2020.

On 8 April 2020 a limited number of EIC-backed up SMEs will have the chance to show their innovative solutions in the fields of agriculture, food & nutrition.

In March 2017, three new entrepreneurs with a great background in the world of engineering and energy launched Rated Power, a start-up that wants to make solar energy the first world source thanks to its solution pvDesign. The leader of this initiative is Andrea Barber, the winner of EDP Open Innovation and participant in the 2017 edition of the Global Entrepreneurship Summit. The Spanish CEO of Rated Power is playing an important role in a technical sector, historically covered by men.

The e-pitching session in partnership with ESA gathered six companies supported by the European Innovation Council. The EIC-backed SME’s pitched their innovative ideas on Aerospace via webcam to an expert jury consisted out of representatives from Luxembourg Space Agency, NewSpace Capital, Barcamper Ventures, Mitsui, CosmiCapital & Safran.

The European Innovation Council (EIC) Business Acceleration Services and Euronext invite you to apply for our joint EIC Investor Day, a specially designed service to pitch your business to top-tier European investors, explore new finance opportunities and learn more about going public.

1 in 20 people will live with a rare disease at some point in their life. Despite this, there is no cure for the majority of rare diseases, and many go undiagnosed. It is not surprising that misdiagnoses are ranging from 10 to 40%. But in medicine, errors cost lives. How do doctors can get better and faster information about which symptoms mean new diseases? This is where “Symptoma” comes in - an intelligent database for doctors - and at the same time, one of the most promising Salzburg startups with potential for the world market.

On 10 March 2020, a limited number of EIC-backed up SMEs will have the chance to pitch their innovations to investors at Bpifrance during the joint EIC Investor Day. The event will take place during the Deep Tech Week in Paris.

On 19-20 February 2020, companies supported under the European Innovation Council (EIC)  had the opportunity to accelerate their business collaborating with AB InBev, the world’s leading brewer and one of Europe’s biggest food and drinks companies. AB InBev opened its doors to 32 SMEs to pitch and present their business cases at the group’s Global Innovation and Technology Center (GITEC) in its home city of Leuven, Belgium.

The European Innovation Council Business Acceleration Services, together with Tchibo and Beiersdorf, invite you to apply for our joint EIC Corporate Day, a specially designed service to increase and accelerate your business collaborations. Beiersdorf, a global player in personal-care products, and Tchibo, one of Germany largest retail chains, are looking for innovative approaches to sustainable solutions, digital consumer experience/sales channels and non-food, among many other things.

This first round of investment will enable Libeo to accelerate its growth, target the European market, recruit new talent and enhance its financial forecasting capabilities, which rely on artificial intelligence.

On 11 February 2020, International Day of Women and Girls in Science, Commissioner Gabriel launched the 7th edition of the EU Prize for Women Innovators. Applications are now open until Tuesday 21 April at 17:00 CET (Brussels time). If you think you have what it takes to become the next EU Woman Innovator, don’t miss your chance and apply now.

Natural Language Processing (NLP) has taken great strides recently. And Bitext Technology is making huge advances in this field. This year, the company funded by the European Innovation Council (EIC) have partnered with Amazon Connect to offer three new services. Bitext will implement a full-fledged conversational Interactive Voice Response in the Amazon Connect contact centre.

The first e-pitching session of 2020 featured four excellent EIC-backed SME’s pitching their business ideas and next investment rounds on cybersecurity to representatives from the European Business Angels Network (EBAN).

Private venture capitalists from Europe are reinvesting in the European payment solution for iPhones and Android smartphones.

The EIC-funded company BotsAndUs announced a partnership with British Airways to provide a solution that will reduce travel stress by assisting all passengers with relevant information to their journey and airport stay. The robot Bill will interact with customers in multiple languages and escort them to locations such as cafes, toilets, meeting rooms and family check-in zones.

On March 3rd a limited number of EIC-backed up SMEs will have the chance to show their innovative solutions in the aerospace sector.

The EIC-funded company raised 19 million € in Series A financing round to deploy their breakthrough technology and take the leadership of the human-friendly third-generation AI.