Ministry Announces New Call to Support Digital Transformation-related Research

Bratislava, 21 August (TASR) - The Investment, Regional Development and Informatisation Ministry again announced a call to support research and development in the field of digital transformation amounting to €45 million on Thursday, ministry State Secretary Radoslav Stefanek told a news conference on the same day. The ministry scrapped the previous call in mid-July due to alleged serious implementation risks and flaws. Firms have until September 30 to file applications for non-refundable financial contributions for their projects. The ministry plans to support 34 projects. The bottom limit for supported projects will be €300,000, while the ministry increased the ceiling limit when compared to the cancelled call to €2.2 million. According to Stefanek, another change concerns the selection of evaluators, with individual projects to be evaluated solely by Slovak experts, while in the previous call the commission was to include foreign experts as well. The call is intended for small, medium and large-scale companies, universities and scientific institutions. Companies and institutions can have up to 60 percent of the eligible costs refunded. The first condition is that the company is engaged in experimental development. In this case, successful applicants should see 25 percent of eligible costs refunded. An applicant can obtain an additional 20 percent if it is a small company with a turnover of up to €10 million and with no more than 50 employees. For medium and large-scale companies, this part of the support is lower. According to Stefanek, companies that implement a project outside Bratislava should be entitled to the reimbursement of an additional 15 percent of eligible costs. Eligible expenditures are the salaries of current and future employees. Another category of eligible expenditures is depreciation of equipment. The final item is the possibility of applying so-called flat-rate reporting or flat-rate expenditures. These have been increased by 20 percent when compared to the previous call. The ministry wants to have the call evaluated by the end of November. ko/df