Nine defence companies seek €175 million from EIC. Applications are ahead of investment decisions.
The first STEP Scale Up Defence call has a €100 million budget for 2026. Shortlisted interviews are expected in January and results in February 2027.
- EIC
- Defence
Nine applications have requested €175 million in equity investment from the first EIC STEP Scale Up Defence call.
The 29 October submission update records demand from seven countries, while the programme’s 2026 budget is €100 million.
Requested investment is therefore 1.75 times that budget. That comparison describes applications against an allocation, not money awarded or a company success rate. Proposals remain under evaluation.
Equity, rather than an equipment order
The call offers direct EIC Fund equity investment of €10-30 million per company. It is intended to support larger funding rounds of at least three times the EIC contribution. For a business, that makes the financing structure and other investors central to the opportunity.
An equity investment strengthens a company’s financing; it does not itself purchase its defence products. Our interpretation is that production scale-up still needs its own evidence of demand, delivery capability and supported use. Counting an application as either investment received or future procurement would combine separate decisions.
The next milestone is selection
EIC expects interviews with shortlisted candidates in January 2027 and results in February. Those are the timetable’s stated expectations, not completed investment decisions. The update does not identify the applicants or publish a company-by-company allocation.
One third of applications came from widening countries, described by the Commission as countries with lower research and innovation performance. That proportion is about the applicant pool. It does not establish which countries or companies will receive investment.
What the numbers can support
For investors and industrial partners, the immediate finding is a defined pool of defence companies seeking substantial growth capital. It is too early to infer a funded pipeline of nine companies, deployment quantities or a selection rate from these totals.
This call is closed. Companies considering a later opportunity should use the current EIC rules and distinguish the equity route from grants and customer contracts. The published update supplies no new application deadline.
Sources & context
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