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Grant Analysis

Purpose & Target

Core objective: Advance 6G architectures, systems, and technologies to simplify network operations, decrease operational expenditures, and enable new services or service models.
Target recipients: Legal entities capable of undertaking Research and Innovation Actions (RIAs).
Size: Not specified, open to a wide range of organizations.
SECTOR-SPECIFIC: Focuses on Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), Telecommunications, AI, and Networking.
Geographic scope: Legal entities established in EU Member States, Associated Countries, OECD countries, and Mercosur countries.
Key filtering criteria: Proposals must address one of five specific areas: New architectural solutions, Deep learning models for constrained AI operations, Real-time serverless computing, Autonomous cognitive agents, or Goal-oriented communication.
Grant frequency: Part of the recurring annual HORIZON-JU-SNS call.

Financial Structure

Minimum contribution per grant: 3,000,000.0 EUR
Maximum contribution per grant: 3,000,000.0 EUR
Total budget for this specific topic (HORIZON-JU-SNS-2025-01-STREAM-B-01-01): 15,000,000.0 EUR (expected to fund 5 grants).
Financial and operational capacity requirements, along with exclusion rules, are governed by General Annex C of the Horizon Europe Work Programme 2023-2025.
The legal and financial setup of grants adheres to General Annex G of the Horizon Europe Work Programme 2023-2025.

Eligibility Requirements

General Eligibility

Applicant must be a legal entity.
Must be established in an EU Member State, an Associated Country to Horizon Europe, an OECD country, or a Mercosur country.
Proposals must adhere to general conditions outlined in Annex A of the Horizon Europe Work Programme 2023-2025, specifically a 70-page limit for full RIA proposals.
Compliance with General Annex B of the Work Programme General Annexes is required.

Restrictions and Exclusions

Entities directly or indirectly controlled by a non-eligible country or non-eligible country entity may not participate unless strong guarantees are provided and positively assessed by their eligible country of establishment (if an EU Member State or Associated Country).
Guarantees must confirm that control is not restricted, access to sensitive information is prevented (employees may require national security clearance), and intellectual property remains within the recipient, free from non-eligible country control/export without approval.
Entities assessed as high-risk suppliers of mobile network communication equipment (or entities fully or partially owned/controlled by them) are not eligible as beneficiaries, affiliated entities, or associated partners, as per ‘restrictions for the protection of European communication networks’.
Legal entities established in Russia, Belarus, or non-government controlled territories of Ukraine are not eligible to participate in any capacity (including beneficiaries, affiliated entities, associated partners, third parties, subcontractors, or recipients of financial support). Exceptions may be granted for duly justified reasons.
Legal entities established outside Russia but whose proprietary rights are directly or indirectly owned for more than 50% by legal persons established in Russia are also not eligible.

Technical and Capacity Requirements

While not explicitly defined, the nature of Research and Innovation Actions (RIAs) implies the need for significant technical expertise and operational capacity in advanced telecommunications, networking, and AI research and development.

Gender Equality Plans

Public bodies, research organizations, or higher education establishments (including private ones) must provide a gender equality plan as per Part B of the General Annexes to the Horizon Europe Work Programme 2023-2025.

Application Process

Application method: Proposals must be submitted online via the Funding & Tenders Portal.
Submission type: This is a single-stage submission process.
A call-specific application form will be used, which will be made available directly within the Submission System.

Timeline

Submission session available from: 2025-05-22
Application deadline: 2025-09-18 00:00:00+0000
The indicative timeline for evaluation and grant agreement follows the procedures outlined in General Annex F of the Horizon Europe Work Programme 2023-2025.

Required Documentation

The limit for a full proposal is 70 pages for Research and Innovation Actions (RIAs).
General Annex A of the Horizon Europe Work Programme 2023-2025 provides further details on required proposal layout and content.

Post-Award Requirements

Participants in selected projects will be required to cooperate within the broader SNS Programme for topics of common interest by signing a formal collaboration agreement, as referenced in Annex 5 of the Model Grant Agreement (MGA).
For all SNS topics under Stream B, any AI/ML training datasets created and utilized within the selected projects must be made available through a common, openly accessed repository. This repository will be accessible to and may be used by other SNS projects throughout the program's lifecycle.

Evaluation Criteria

General Award Criteria

Award criteria, scoring, and thresholds are primarily described in Annex D of the Work Programme General Annexes.
These general criteria are complemented by specific considerations for this call.

Impact Section Complements

Contribution to SME objectives: A sub-criterion will be introduced in the impact section to assess the proposal's contribution to overall SME objectives.
Contribution to IKOP objectives: A sub-criterion will be introduced in the impact section to assess the proposal's contribution to IKOP objectives.

Ranking and Selection Priorities (Specific to this Topic)

The selection of proposals will prioritize achieving a balanced portfolio across the five identified priorities within this topic.
Grants will be awarded not only based on ranking but also to ensure at least one project is funded from the highest ranked within each of the 5 Topic areas/priorities, provided all thresholds are met and budget is available.
If a proposal addresses multiple priorities, applicants must clearly indicate the main covered priority (its 'centre of gravity').

Tie-breaking Procedure (for equally ranked RIA proposals)

In cases where two RIA proposals are equally ranked, the following criteria will be applied sequentially to break the tie:
Coverage criterion.
Excellence criterion.
Generic Impact criterion.
Level of SME participation (if still inconclusive after the first three).
Level of IKOP (if still inconclusive after SME participation).
If still inconclusive, the procedure outlined in part F of the General Annex will be resumed from step 3 onwards.

Compliance & Special Requirements

Regulatory Compliance

Projects must ensure full adherence to the relevant Horizon Europe regulations.
Compliance with Article 22(5) of the Horizon Europe Regulation is critical, particularly concerning restrictions on participation aimed at safeguarding the Union’s strategic assets, interests, autonomy, and security.
Strict compliance is required regarding the ‘restrictions for the protection of European communication networks’, specifically excluding entities identified as high-risk suppliers of mobile network communication equipment.
Legal entities from Russia, Belarus, or non-government controlled territories of Ukraine are expressly excluded from participation, as are entities over 50% owned by Russian legal persons.

Ethical and Social Considerations

Organizations required to provide a gender equality plan must ensure it is in place.
Proposals should address gender dimension in research and innovation content where appropriate, especially if research results are expected to differ when applied to different gender populations of users.

Intellectual Property (IP) and Data Sharing

Intellectual property policies are governed by General Annex G of the Horizon Europe Work Programme 2023-2025.
Crucially, ownership of IP arising from the action must remain within the recipient during and after completion of the action.
This IP must not be subject to control or restrictions by non-eligible countries or non-eligible country entities, nor exported or accessed from outside eligible countries without explicit approval from the country where the legal entity is established.
All AI/ML training datasets developed under Stream B projects must be openly shared via a common repository accessible to other SNS projects.

Technical Focus Areas (for project proposal alignment)

New architectural solutions: Development of simplified 6G architectures (user and control plane) for efficient service introduction, integration of new network domains, and seamless roaming, addressing current limitations of Service-Based Architecture (SBA).
Deep learning models: Creation and evaluation of deep learning models with predefined constraints (e.g., physical laws, logical rules) for network operation optimization, particularly under energy and security constraints, and managing untrusted data sources.
Real time serverless computing: Research into provisioning and orchestration algorithms for database/storage services (Function-as-a-Service - FaaS), emphasizing execution on various network parts (e.g., edge), versatile function placement, instant start methods, high-dimensional task orchestration, and embedded security.
Autonomous Cognitive Agents: Defining architectures for simplicity, scalability, and security, integrating service composition and knowledge handling in a network-compute continuum. Focus on decentralized multi-agent systems that can excel individual agents and operate spontaneously while under effective management control.
Goal-oriented Communication: Designing revolutionary communication protocols, languages, and media for AI-equipped devices (especially with generative AI), enabling them to extract and communicate only goal-relevant information to reduce communication, computing, storage, and energy consumption. Full system concepts, including control and management aspects, are expected.

Grant Details