European Capital of Innovation Awards 2024 (€1 million prize)

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About European Capital of Innovation Awards 2024

The European Capital of Innovation Awards (Capital), supported by the European Innovation Council (EIC) under Horizon Europe, recognise those European cities that open their governance practices to experimentation and aim at being role models for other cities by pushing the boundaries of technology for the benefit of their citizens.

The award will raise the profile of the cities that have developed and implemented innovative policies; established frameworks that boost breakthrough innovation; enhanced the city attractiveness towards investors, industry, enterprises and talents; helped to open up connections and strengthen links with other cities, promoting the replication of best practices in the innovation field; enhanced citizens' involvement in the decision-making process; and supported cities resilience.

The contest will award a total of six prizes for two categories: the European Capital of Innovation and the Rising Innovative City.

• Sponsor Organisation: European Commission (EC)

Benefits of European Capital of Innovation Awards 2024

• The city winning the 2024 European Capital of Innovation title will receive €1 million. Moreover, the first two runners-up of this category will be rewarded with €100,000 each.
• In the Rising Innovative City category, the winner will be rewarded with €500,000 accompanied by two runners-up that will receive €50,000 each.
• All winners and runners up will be invited to join the EIC Prizes Alumni network, a prestigious group of previous Capital winners, to share their knowledge, discuss common challenges, and work together to find solutions.

European Capital of Innovation Awards 2024 Requirements

• The candidate towns and cities must be located in one of the EU Member States or Associated Countries to Horizon Europe.
• For the category of European Capital of Innovation, the candidate city must have a minimum population of 250,000 inhabitants. In countries where there are no such cities, the city coming closest to 250,000 inhabitants is eligible to apply for the European Capital of Innovation category, provided that it has a minimum population of 50,000 inhabitants and that the city did not apply for the European Rising Innovative City category.
• The candidate towns and cities for the European Rising Innovative City category must have a population of 50,000 and up to 249,999 inhabitants.
• Winners of former European Capital of Innovation Awards editions, as well as runners-up of the edition 2023 are not eligible. This does not apply to previous finalist cities.

• Applicants that have already received an EU or Euratom prize cannot receive a second prize for

• the same activities.

  Selection Criteria

  Two high-level juries of independent experts will evaluate how the applicant cities are pushing the boundaries of innovation by looking at the following criteria:

• Experimenting to make the city a testbed for innovative practices;
• Escalating and accelerating the growth of startups and SMEs;
• Ecosystem building and fostering of synergies among the public sector, industry, academia, and the citizens;
• Expanding the city's innovation capacity to become a role model for other cities;
• City innovative vision that positively transforms the city and develops a sustainable innovation ecosystem.
• Citizens' rights - the use of innovation to strengthen democracy, to protect citizens' rights, to foster social cohesion, and ensure integration with a special view on minorities, gender, disability, or race.

Application Date and Process

• Visit the link to the application website to get started with your application process.

Application Deadline

18 June, 2024

Scholarship Application Portal

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