The Ministry of the Economy and Innovation of the Republic of Lithuania announces additional invitations for applications under the Inostartas and Inočekiai measures. This is aimed at promoting the formation of innovative companies in Lithuania and encouraging businesses to engage in innovative activities more actively and to establish mutually beneficial collaborative relations. The estimated investments in these measures total almost EUR 2 million.

’Enhancing Lithuania’s innovation ecosystem is among the State’s priorities. These invitations will be useful for small and medium businesses as they will receive funding for employing people with qualifications and for advancing innovative activities. The support will enable the development and realisation of innovative products’, says Aušrinė Armonaitė, the Minister of Economy and Innovation.

The Inostartas measure will help promote the establishment and expansion of new innovative small and medium enterprises (SMEs). It will also ensure the development of innovative ideas, products, and services and promote the enterprises’ independence in their research and development (R&D) activities. Almost EUR 1.3 million will be allocated under this measure.

Activities supported under the Inostartas measure include the formation of innovative SMEs that introduce innovation. The measure will also contribute to the employment of researchers and scientists in knowledge-consuming in micro-, small- and medium-size businesses that create commercial innovative products. The Inostartas measure promotes the development of SMEs.

95 projects are being implemented under the Inostartas measure, with the EUR 3.3 million funding allotted to them. 135 projects have already been completed under this measure (EUR 3.9 million investments in all).

It is planned that under the Inočekiai invitation intended for startup innovators, up to EUR 140,000, and under an invitation for mature innovators up to EUR 485,000 will be allocated, totaling EUR 625,000.

The Inočekiai measure is aimed at encouraging businesses and research institutions to establish new collaborations and to continue joint R&D activities that are already underway. Innovative activities will be promoted by this measure, and enterprises will be enabled to make use of the opportunities offered by cooperation between business and science.

Applications under the Inočekiai measure can be submitted by legal persons except for scientific and academic institutions that are already engaged in or intend to carry out R&D.
Funding provided under the invitations of the Inočekiai measure to both startup and mature innovators will be intended for innovation cheques which will be used for the R&D activities already carried out or to be carried out based on feasibility studies prepared for R&D projects.

122 projects are being implemented under the Inočekiai measure, with EUR 2.5 million funding allotted. EUR 4.4 million was previously allotted for 181 projects which have already been completed.

Entities seeking funding should complete the application form published on http://www.esinvesticijos.lt and https://eimin.lrv.lt/lt and submit it to the Agency for Science, Innovation, and Technology (MITA) by 31 October 2021.