EIT EdTech Conference Open Call 2026

EIT EdTech Conference Open Call 2026

This is a historical reference for the 2026 EIT EdTech Conference Open Call. EIT Urban Mobility published the call on 22 April 2026 and set a closing time of 23 June 2026 at 17:00 CEST, Brussels time. The official EIT Urban Mobility call listing now labels it a closed call. No replacement EdTech Conference open call or later application deadline is announced on the official call pages reviewed for this update, so this page should not be read as an invitation to submit a late application.

The call sought one organisation or one consortium to design, plan, organise and deliver two consecutive editions of the EIT EdTech Conference, in 2027 and 2028. It was an event-delivery subgrant rather than a product-development grant, startup prize, or individual fellowship. Its intended contractor needed to combine a credible European EdTech network with the practical ability to run a high-level, policy-connected conference from early planning through post-event reporting.

Official status and key facts

The amount needs careful interpretation. The official material calls it the maximum or indicative EIT funding for the call and says that it covers the two editions together, not EUR 600,000 for each year. The call manual also says the EIT contribution could cover no more than 90% of eligible project costs. An applicant therefore had to declare the full project budget and provide at least 10% from non-EIT sources. The headline amount was an upper limit for the selected project, not a guaranteed payment to every applicant and not a personal award.

What the call was intended to fund

The EIT EdTech Conference was presented as an ecosystem-building initiative bringing together European EdTech companies, the EIT Community, educators, researchers, public stakeholders, investors and other organisations. The purpose was to strengthen connections between the EdTech sector and EIT initiatives, show European success stories, improve links between industry and educators, support innovation and investment, and contribute to European digital education, skills and workforce priorities.

The selected partner was expected to handle the full event lifecycle. The official info-session materials grouped that work into strategic setup and governance, programme and experience design, operational delivery, stakeholder management, communications and branding, sponsorship and a demonstration zone, plus outcomes and reporting. This makes the opportunity materially different from a call that only pays for venue hire or speaker travel. The proposal needed to explain the operating model behind the conference, the people responsible for each part, and how the two editions would form a coherent programme.

The minimum expected format described in the information session was a one-day in-person annual conference. The 2027 edition was to be in Brussels, with at least 250 registered participants and a curated group of roughly 160 to 200 high-level attendees. The intended audience included EIT Community initiatives, higher-education institutions, EdTech companies, startups, associations, EU institutions, student representatives and investors. Geographical and gender balance were stated requirements. The call remained open to complementary formats when an applicant could justify them, but a proposal still had to meet the call’s scale and audience expectations.

The call also carried a financial-sustainability requirement that is easy to miss when reading only the headline page. The selected applicant or consortium had to generate at least EUR 80,000 in gross project-related revenue, excluding VAT, over the full project duration and transfer that revenue to EIT Urban Mobility. The manual listed ticket sales, sponsorship packages, demo booths or exhibition space, and corporate partnership packages as possible revenue streams. Any additional revenue mechanism required prior written approval. This obligation meant that a serious proposal needed a credible income plan, not only a cost schedule.

Who was eligible

The call was open to legal entities established in an EU Member State or in a third country associated with Horizon Europe. Individuals could not apply as individuals under the stated eligibility rule. A mono-beneficiary proposal could come from one eligible legal entity. A multi-participant proposal could combine eligible entities, but the consortium had to show complementary expertise and a clear allocation of roles.

The official requirements were more demanding than geographic eligibility alone. Applicants had to demonstrate proven experience organising high-level European or international events, a strong position in the EdTech, education or innovation ecosystem, capacity for programme design and end-to-end event operations, and the ability to mobilise a diverse, multi-stakeholder audience at European level. The information session also highlighted the need to operate in the Brussels and EU environment, coordinate closely with EIT Urban Mobility, and use interactive formats such as co-creation, matchmaking or workshops where appropriate.

For a consortium, the lead partner needed to be more than an administrative name on the form. The information session assigned the lead responsibility for coordination, reporting and compliance, and revenue management. Every consortium partner had to complete the Partner Information Form in NetSuite and provide the correct Participant Identification Code. A consortium made up of organisations with overlapping skills but no clear division of responsibility would have been hard to defend against the stated complementarity requirement.

What applicants had to prepare

The call page identified the Call Manual, Guidelines for Applicants, Financial Support Agreement template and Declaration of Honour template as the core call documents. It also pointed applicants to reference documents covering EIT Community initiatives, branding, appeals, eligible expenditure, the Horizon Europe Annotated Grant Agreement, project implementation, the KIC code of conduct, the EIT impact framework and the EIT Urban Mobility strategic agenda.

The guidelines and information session described the supporting evidence that applicants had to enter or upload in the submission system. Relevant previous projects or events had to identify the event or project, the applicant’s role, duration, approximate budget, participant numbers and type, and evidence of engagement with EdTech or related innovation and education stakeholders. Applicants also had to provide an organisational profile and team structure, with roles, responsibilities and reporting lines, plus CVs for key personnel responsible for coordination, management and delivery. Other relevant supporting documentation could be supplied where it helped substantiate the award criteria.

The budget was linked to the work plan. Applicants were expected to divide activities into work packages, connect deliverables to those work packages, and then allocate costs by partner and by cost category. Budget explanations needed to show what each cost would cover. The proposal had to declare 100% of the total project budget, respect Horizon Europe cost rules, identify the EIT and own-funding shares, and preserve the minimum 10% co-funding rate across the project duration. Because the budget tab was generated from the work plan, the guidelines recommended finalising the work-plan structure before completing the budget.

How submission worked during the open window

Applications had to be submitted online through EIT Urban Mobility’s Programmes Portal, also called NetSuite. The process had three initial access steps:

1. Register the organisation in the EU Funding & Tenders Opportunities Portal and obtain a valid nine-digit PIC, unless the organisation already had one.
2. Register for, or sign in to, the EIT Urban Mobility Programmes Portal and complete the required partner information.
3. In NetSuite, go to Grant Management, then Grant Management, then Open Calls, select EIT EdTech Conference, and create the application.

The application form covered main information, partner information, project scope, a work plan, supporting documents and a budget. The guidance recommended drafting narrative answers offline before copying final text into the form. Applicants had to save their work because the portal did not save every change automatically. Before submitting, the form had to be complete, all mandatory documents had to be present, and the budget and work packages had to be consistent. The submission action was final: once an application was submitted, it could not be reverted or replaced with an updated version. EIT Urban Mobility advised applicants not to wait until the last minute so that staff could help with a technical problem.

Those steps are retained here as a record of how the 2026 cycle operated. They are not current instructions for a live application. Since the official listing marks the call closed and no later cycle is announced there, prospective applicants should not assume that NetSuite will accept a new submission under this call identifier.

Evaluation and delivery expectations

After the deadline, EIT Urban Mobility planned admissibility, eligibility, exclusion and selection checks before evaluation. Applications had to use the electronic forms, be complete, include mandatory supporting documents, follow the character limits and be written in English in a readable, accessible and printable form. Late proposals were inadmissible.

The evaluation had two stages. External experts assessed excellence, novelty and innovation, impact, and quality and efficiency of implementation for a combined 70 points. At least 40 of those 70 points were required to proceed to the second stage. The Selection Committee then assessed strategic fit with the KIC portfolio and financial-sustainability principles, along with previous experience, for a further 30 points.

The scoring detail shows what a competitive proposal needed to prove. Excellence included clear objectives, a pan-European dimension, knowledge-triangle alignment, participatory or otherwise distinctive methods, and gender mainstreaming and inclusiveness. Impact covered the ability to connect EdTech with the EIT Community, mobilise high-level stakeholders across sectors and geographies, communicate before and after the event, comply with branding requirements, and sustain the conference beyond a single edition. Implementation covered the work plan, risk mitigation, attendee recruitment and selection, balanced representation, and the complementarity of the lead or consortium.

The indicative project timeline in the call manual ran from a tentative start on 1 September 2026 to a tentative end on 30 November 2028. The information session described implementation more generally as running from the fourth quarter of 2026 to November 2028. These were planning assumptions for the selected project, not a new application window. Strategic and operational decisions related to conference design and implementation were subject to prior validation and final approval by EIT Urban Mobility, and the selected partner had to provide the required monitoring, reporting and KPI deliverables.

Practical archive guidance

This opportunity was a strong fit for an established event operator, university or education organisation with a proven European network, or a consortium that paired those capabilities with communications, sponsorship, policy and production expertise. It was a weak fit for an early-stage team without legal-entity status, event references, financial controls or a credible route to a European audience. A good concept alone could not replace evidence of delivery capacity.

The most important historical lessons are the scope and the compliance burden. The funding was for two conference editions, the EIT contribution was capped at 90% of eligible costs, the project carried an EUR 80,000 revenue-generation requirement, and one lead partner had to own coordination and compliance. Evidence of earlier events had to be concrete: budgets, audience size, roles, stakeholder links and team qualifications mattered. The selection framework also rewarded a programme that could produce recommendations, partnerships and follow-up activity rather than a conference agenda with no route to outcomes.

Readers looking for a live opportunity should use the current EIT Urban Mobility call catalogue and verify that a new EdTech Conference call has been published. This archive entry keeps the real 2026 deadline so the page accurately records the closed competition. It does not claim that the programme is permanently discontinued; it records only that this cycle has ended and that no next cycle was announced on the official pages checked for this update.

Official sources

• EIT Urban Mobility call page
• EIT Urban Mobility call catalogue
• EIT EdTech Conference Call Manual
• EIT EdTech Conference information session