EUREKA NETWORK

Their core work

EUREKA Network is the Brussels-based secretariat of the intergovernmental EUREKA initiative, which supports market-oriented R&D collaboration across Europe and beyond. Within H2020, they focus on SME innovation policy — designing and evaluating programmes that help small companies exploit research results commercially. Their work centres on impact assessment, monitoring frameworks, and viability testing for collaborative business solutions targeting international markets. They operate at the intersection of innovation policy and practical SME support, bridging the gap between funded research and real-world business application.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

EUREKA Network's H2020 activity is concentrated in a narrow 2019–2021 window, making long-term trend analysis limited. Their earliest project (INNOWWIDE, 2019) focused on SME policy making and impact evaluation at macro level, while later projects (LEEP-SME, PRO-Ethics, both 2020) shifted toward more granular concerns: practical exploitation of SME results, monitoring methodologies, and ethics in funding decisions. The keyword shift from broad policy terms to application-focused language (exploitation potential, application in practice) suggests a move from programme design toward programme improvement and accountability.

Moving from designing SME support programmes toward evaluating their real-world effectiveness and ensuring ethical governance of funding — useful for partners working on responsible innovation or evidence-based policy.

How they like to work

EUREKA Network participates exclusively as a partner, never leading H2020 consortia — consistent with their role as an intergovernmental body that contributes policy expertise rather than driving individual research agendas. With 25 unique partners across 14 countries from just 3 projects, they operate in large, diverse consortia and bring a wide European network to the table. Their value to a consortium is institutional credibility and access to the broader EUREKA ecosystem of national funding bodies and innovation agencies.

Despite only 3 H2020 projects, EUREKA Network has collaborated with 25 distinct partners spanning 14 countries, reflecting their pan-European institutional reach. Their network likely extends well beyond H2020 through the EUREKA intergovernmental framework connecting 45+ countries.

What sets them apart

EUREKA Network is not a research performer — it is the secretariat of one of Europe's oldest and largest intergovernmental R&D support frameworks (est. 1985). Partnering with them gives a consortium direct access to a network of national innovation agencies and a track record of evaluating what actually works in SME innovation support. For anyone building a policy-oriented or coordination project targeting SME exploitation of research, EUREKA brings unmatched institutional reach and credibility.

Highlights from their portfolio

• INNOWWIDE
  By far the largest project (EUR 7.7M) — assessed viability of collaborative business solutions in worldwide markets, reflecting EUREKA's global ambitions beyond Europe.
• LEEP-SME
  Directly targeted the problem of SME projects producing results that never reach the market — a core mission alignment for EUREKA's mandate to bridge research and business.