Eureka Cluster Xecs: How mid-sized companies get into European electronics projects
Xecs is one of the few European funding programmes designed around companies rather than large consortia. For technology-driven mid-sized companies in electronics, sensing and photonics, it is often the most realistic route into an international R&D project.
Many companies with 100 to 500 employees know the problem: Horizon Europe and Chips JU projects are too large and their consortia hard to access. National programmes, on the other hand, fall short as soon as a development step needs partners abroad. This is exactly the gap Xecs fills.
What is Xecs?
Xecs is the Eureka Cluster for Electronic Components and Systems (ECS). It was launched in 2021 as the successor to the PENTA and EURIPIDES² programmes and is run by the industry association AENEAS.
Eureka is an intergovernmental network of more than 40 member countries that operates independently of the EU framework programmes. This has a practical advantage: topics come from industry, and procedures are leaner than in Horizon Europe.
What is funded
Xecs supports market-oriented research and development along the entire electronics value chain: from materials and manufacturing equipment to chips, sensors and power electronics, all the way to embedded systems and applications. The programme follows the European ECS research agenda but is open to any topic within it. You bring your own project idea.
Projects are typically smaller than Chips JU projects but larger than national collaborative projects. Companies of all sizes, research organisations and universities can take part. Those who benefit most are companies that want to bring a concrete product or process closer to market.
How funding works
Xecs does not hand out money itself. It awards a quality label, after which each participating country funds its own partners under its national rules. Funding rates, eligibility and procedures therefore differ from country to country, and each partner has to check the conditions of its national funding agency early on.
In Germany, for example, Xecs projects are funded by the Federal Ministry of Research, Technology and Space (BMFTR) under its guideline for projects within the European Eureka Clusters, managed by VDI/VDE Innovation + Technik GmbH. The process has two stages (project outline, then formal application), and funding rates follow EU state aid rules: 50 % for industrial research and 25 % for experimental development, with bonuses for SMEs and collaboration of up to 80 %.
Important: the national submission and the international submission to Xecs run in parallel. Meeting only one of the two is not enough.
The rules for consortia
The requirements for a Xecs consortium are manageable:
at least two independent partners from two different Eureka countries
a total project size of at least 35 person-years across all partners
no single country may account for more than 70 % of the project budget
In practice, a mid-sized company with a research institute and a partner company from another country already meets the minimum requirements. The real work lies in finding the right partners and taking their national funding conditions into account from the start.
Process and current calls
Every Xecs call has two stages. First you submit a short project outline. If it is evaluated positively, you submit a full project proposal, followed by the label and the national funding decisions.
Two calls are currently open:
Call | Project outline deadline | Full proposal deadline | Focus |
21 January 2027, 17:00 CET | 15 April 2027 | open topics across the entire electronics value chain | |
26 November 2026, 17:00 CET | 5 March 2027 | applied quantum technologies: sensing, metrology, communication |
Please note: not every Eureka country funds every call. Germany, for instance, does not take part in funding the Quantum Call. German organisations can still join a consortium, but would have to cover their costs themselves. Before building a consortium, check which of the participating countries actually fund the call.
Who Xecs is right for
In our experience, Xecs is a particularly good fit for companies that
want to develop a technology towards a product but are not yet market-ready,
need a partner abroad for this, such as a user, supplier or specialised institute,
and have enough development capacity to carry a two- to three-year project.
Xecs is less suitable for pure basic research or for projects a company can carry out alone. For the latter, national programmes are usually faster.
How we support you
We have been guiding companies through European funding procedures since 2009. For Xecs, we take over the parts that cost the most time internally: we check whether your project fits Xecs, find suitable partners across Europe, write the project outline with you and coordinate the parallel national submissions.
We deliberately work with mid-sized companies and scale-ups. That means short lines of communication, fast responses and an approach built around your project rather than a standard process.
Wondering whether Xecs is right for your project? Get in touch. In a 20-minute call, we will give you an honest assessment of which call fits and what is realistic before the deadline.
Comments