A recent LinkedIn post by Kirill Svavolia, founder of Inburgering.org, put eight European funding deadlines on one page. That is rarer than it should be. Official calls sit on different Commission portals, Joint Undertaking websites, cascade-funding platforms and national agency pages, and founders often discover them after the useful preparation time has gone.

EuropeanTechOnHeels checked every item on that list against the official programme pages on 10 November 2026. Most of the dates hold up. A few need a correction or a warning: one programme’s own documents disagree by four days, the EU’s AI Factories have an extra cut-off this week, and one scheme described as “also open” is not taking applications again until mid-December.

Public money will not replace a funding round. It can, however, pay for Cyber Resilience Act work, buy months of GPU time, or finance a first supercomputing experiment without handing over equity. Several of the larger calls close in January, which means the unglamorous work — finding a partner in another country, registering a PIC number, or securing a letter from a national space delegation — has to start now.

The deadlines at a glance

Dates below are taken from official pages. Times and time zones appear only where the source publishes them. Always re-check the linked page before you submit; calls are sometimes amended.

Deadline	Programme	What is on offer	Who it is for
13 Nov 2026, 10:00 CET	EU AI Factories, Large Scale Access	Free GPU time, more than 50,000 GPU hours	Industry users, including AI startups and SMEs
16 Nov 2026, or 20 Nov 2026 (conflict)	EUDIS Business Accelerator, Cohort 4	€120,000 non-dilutive seed voucher, plus coaching	Defence and dual-use startups and scale-ups
30 Nov 2026, 10:00 CET; 15 Dec 2026, 10:00 CET; 4 Jan 2027, 10:00 CET	EU AI Factories, later Large Scale cut-offs	Free GPU time, more than 50,000 GPU hours	Same industrial innovation track
Anytime	EU AI Factories, Playground	Smaller GPU allocations for 1, 2 or 3 months	SMEs and startups, including first-time users
11 Dec 2026	SECURE, second open call	Up to €30,000, covering 50% of eligible costs	Individual MSMEs making or selling digital products
13 Jan 2027, 16:00 CET	EIT Health Innovation Validation Call 2027	Up to €850,000, covering up to 50% of costs	Consortia validating a digital or AI medical device
14 Jan 2027, 17:00 CET	Digital Europe, AI4SME	Expected EU contribution of €3 million to €5 million	A single legal entity or a consortium can apply
14 Jan 2027, 10:00, to 20 Jan 2027, 17:00 Brussels time, or earlier at 200 proposals	FFplus Call 3, Type-1 business experiments	Up to €150,000 for a single SME; up to €200,000 with partners	SMEs with no prior use of HPC services
2 Feb 2027, 17:00 CET	Creative Europe MEDIA, video games and immersive content	Up to €200,000 as a lump-sum grant	European game, XR or audiovisual developers
26 Feb 2027, 13:00 CET, then 30 Apr 2027, 13:00 CEST	ESA Kick-start Activities	Up to €75,000, at 75% of costs	Teams testing a satellite-based service

16 or 20 November: EUDIS Business Accelerator

The EUDIS Business Accelerator is the European Commission’s defence-focused programme for startups and scale-ups. Cohort 4 will take 20 companies through an eight-month programme from March 2027, with five on-site bootcamps, more than 300 hours of coaching and a €120,000 seed-financing voucher. The programme FAQ is explicit that companies do not give up equity for the voucher. Payments are split into two tranches of 20% and 80%, unlocked against a scorecard agreed with the lead coach. The Commission’s own EUDIS page says the top three teams receive an additional €50,000; the accelerator FAQ describes an extra “reward voucher” without repeating that figure.

There is a real date conflict. The Cohort 4 application guidelines list the application window as 5 October to 16 November. The live programme website, and a programme announcement, say the call is open until 20 November 2026. The FAQ gives a clock time of 23:59, but writes the year as 2027 and the time zone as CEST, which Europe does not use in mid-November. Founders should treat 16 November as the safe deadline unless the application portal itself shows a later close.

The website opens the call to startups and scale-ups established in the 27 EU member states or European Defence Fund associated countries, and says Ukrainian companies are eligible. Companies must not be controlled by an entity from a non-associated third country. The written guidelines add further filters: the company should be no more than 20 years old, have an established management team, and either have raised at least €200,000 or show year-on-year revenue above €200,000. Named technology themes include autonomous systems and robotics, counter-drone systems, and defence production, sustainment and logistics. Apply on the official accelerator site, not through a shortened social-media link.

This week, then monthly: free GPU time at the EU AI Factories

The original list pointed to 30 November, 15 December and 4 January for free GPU time. Those dates are correct, but they are not the next ones. The EuroHPC Joint Undertaking’s Large Scale Access call for industrial innovation has cut-offs at 10:00 CET on 13 November 2026, 30 November 2026, 15 December 2026 and 4 January 2027. Access is compute time, not cash. Large Scale is intended for requests of more than 50,000 GPU hours, for three, six or twelve months, with a decision within 10 working days of the cut-off if the proposal passes technical and peer review.

Smaller requests can go through Playground Access at any time. Allocations last one, two or three months on a single system, are assessed first come, first served, and can be granted within two working days. There is also a continuous Fast Lane track for more experienced HPC users who need up to 50,000 GPU hours, with access within four working days. Demand is already high: as of this check, MareNostrum and LUMI-G were unavailable for new Large Scale allocations, and some Playground and Fast Lane partitions were also temporarily closed.

Applications go through the EuroHPC access portal. The official Terms of Reference open the industrial tracks to commercial companies, SMEs and startups established or located in an EU member state or in a country associated to Horizon 2020, Horizon Europe or the Digital Europe Programme, depending on which machine is requested. The principal investigator must have an employment contract covering the allocation, and only civilian, AI Act-compliant proposals written in English are eligible. Academic and public-sector users are pointed to a separate “AI for Science” mode.

11 December: help with Cyber Resilience Act costs

The second SECURE open call runs from 1 October to 11 December 2026. The official page does not publish a time of day. The project, funded under the Digital Europe Programme, will distribute cascade grants of up to €30,000, covering 50% of eligible costs, from a call budget of €11.5 million. In practice that means a company must fund the other half; a project whose eligible costs exceed €60,000 is still capped at €30,000 of SECURE money.

Applicants must be individual micro, small or medium-sized enterprises, legally established in an EU member state or an EEA country. Consortia are not eligible. The company should develop, manufacture, import or distribute digital products or services that fall, or are expected to fall, within the scope of the Cyber Resilience Act, and the project must support the applicant’s own compliance. Applications are submitted through the SECURE platform.

13 January: EIT Health will pay to validate a digital medical device

EIT Health’s Innovation Validation Call 2027 closes on 13 January 2027 at 16:00 CET. It is aimed at digital or AI-enabled medical devices, or in-vitro diagnostics, under the EU’s MDR or IVDR rules, that are ready for real-world clinical validation and are approaching market launch. The official page places eligible solutions at Innovation Maturity Level 6, with the aim of reaching level 7 by the end of the project.

A single startup cannot apply alone. Consortia need at least two organisations from different countries, representing at least two sides of the “Knowledge Triangle” of industry, research and education. A commercialising company must lead. EIT Health will fund up to 50% of the total project budget, up to €850,000 per project. If the commercialising entity is a micro or small enterprise, it must receive €400,000 to €500,000 of that grant, and it must sign a Financial Sustainability Contribution Agreement. The call also wants solutions with the potential to reach 150,000 patients or citizens in the EU, and to be on the market and generating at least €10,000 in revenues within three years after the funding period. Organisations need a PIC number from the EU Funding & Tenders Portal, then apply via the EIT Health platform.

14 January: Digital Europe money for AI cybersecurity tools

The Digital Europe topic DIGITAL-ECCC-2027-DEPLOY-CYBER-11-AI4SME closes on 14 January 2027 at 17:00 CET (Brussels). The official call document says the requested EU contribution is expected to be between €3 million and €5 million per project, although other amounts may be considered if they are justified. The topic budget is €20 million, inside a wider cybersecurity call of €96 million that is still subject to final adoption of the work-programme amendment.

This is one of the few large Digital Europe topics that a single organisation can enter. The call document says there is no minimum consortium size for AI4SME, and that a proposal may be submitted by a single applicant. The action is an SME Support Action: SMEs can be reimbursed at 75% of eligible costs, other beneficiaries at 50%. Eligible applicants are legal entities established in the EU or the EEA — Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein — and they must not be controlled from outside those countries. The work is not a research grant in disguise. Proposals should develop or adapt, then validate and deploy, AI-powered cybersecurity products, tools or services for European SMEs, such as user-friendly risk-management, threat-detection, incident-response and notification tools.

14 to 20 January: a first supercomputing experiment, if you are quick

The third FFplus Type-1 call for business experiments opens on 14 January 2027 at 10:00 Brussels time. It will close when 200 proposals have arrived, or at 17:00 Brussels time on 20 January 2027, whichever comes first. The project itself says this is the final FFplus call for business experiments.

The aim is to help SMEs that have had no prior use of, or experience with, HPC services to run a business experiment on modelling, simulation, data analytics or AI. A single SME can ask for up to €150,000. A experiment that includes supporting partners can request up to €200,000, with at least half of the funding going to the main SME unless a deviation is justified. Experiments can last up to 15 months and should start by 1 August 2027. The indicative budget for the whole call is €4 million. Compute time is expected to come separately from EuroHPC access schemes rather than from the cash grant. The FFplus beneficiaries themselves cannot take part as partners.

2 February: money to develop the next European game

Creative Europe MEDIA’s 2027 call for video games and immersive content development (CREA-MEDIA-2027-DEVVGIM) closes on 2 February 2027 at 17:00:00 CET. The maximum grant is €200,000 per project, paid as a lump sum calculated from the estimated budget at a 60% funding rate.

The call is broader than “your next video game”. It also covers interactive narrative immersive experiences, and it excludes publishers. Applicants must be European video-game, XR or audiovisual production companies established in a country that participates fully in the MEDIA strand, and majority-owned by nationals of those countries. The coordinator must show that it produced or developed a previous video game or immersive work that was commercially distributed — meaning it generated revenue — between 1 January 2024 and the submission deadline. A title that merely launched before 2024 can still count if the sales report shows revenue in that window. Work-for-hire, projects credited only to an individual staff member, and Early Access releases are not accepted as the previous work. Production of the new project may not start earlier than 10 months after the deadline.

26 February, then 30 April: ESA Kick-start

ESA Space Solutions evaluates Kick-start proposals in batches. The next two deadlines are 26 February 2027 at 13:00 CET and 30 April 2027 at 13:00 CEST. Later 2027 batches fall on 11 June, 3 September and 5 November. Kick-starts are six-month feasibility studies. They must use at least one space asset, such as satellite communications, Earth-observation data or satellite navigation, and they are meant to test whether a service is technically feasible, commercially viable and in demand.

ESA funds 75% of the activity, up to €75,000. The maximum total cost is therefore €100,000. Before submitting on esa-star, applicants must contact their national delegation and obtain a Written Authorisation of ESA Funding, which has to be included in the cover letter. That national sign-off is not a formality to leave until the last week.

The EIC Accelerator is already open, not waiting for a November launch

The EIC Accelerator remains the European Commission’s main deep-tech scale-up instrument. The dedicated programme page describes a grant component of up to €2.5 million for innovation activities at technology readiness levels 6 to 8, and an investment component of €1 million to €10 million. The 2027 funding overview, published on 5 November 2026 with the new work programme, describes the offer as grants below €2.5 million and investments from €0.5 million to €10 million. In both readings, the grant can be combined with equity or quasi-equity from the EIC Fund.

Short proposals may be submitted at any time. The idea that the 2027 call “opens in November” is therefore already out of date: the work programme is published, and companies can send a short proposal now. If that short proposal receives a “GO”, the full proposal can be batched at 17:00 Brussels time on 20 January, 17 March, 1 September or 4 November 2027.

Also open, or opening soon

Svavolia’s post also flagged five programmes from a wider Dutch list as open EU-wide. Their status on 10 November 2026 is more mixed.

Women TechEU is open, but not at the new headline amount. The current Women TechEU 2 EIC call offers selected women-led early-stage deep-tech startups €75,000 in non-dilutive funding plus mentoring and coaching. Applicants first pass an eligibility strand, which has weekly cut-offs every Tuesday until 15 June 2027, then submit a full proposal. The next full-proposal deadlines are 14 January, 1 April and 8 July 2027, each at 17:00 Brussels time. The EIC’s 2027 work programme says a redesigned Women TechEU will double the grant to €150,000; that is not the amount of the call that is open now.

Eurostars is not open today. According to the Netherlands Enterprise Agency, Eurostars-3 Call 12 opens on 17 December 2026 and closes on 4 March 2027 at 14:00 CET. The previous call closed on 10 September 2026. Eurostars funds cross-border R&D led by an innovative SME, with at least two independent organisations from at least two participating countries. National funding rates and caps differ; Dutch SMEs, for example, can receive 50% support up to €500,000 for the Dutch share of a project. Companies should check both the Eureka Network pages and their own national funding body.

Innowwide is open. The fifth call, also summarised by RVO, opened on 1 October 2026 and closes on 1 December 2026 at 14:00 CET. It pays a fixed grant of €60,000, covering up to 70% of a project whose costs are at least €86,000, for a six-month study of a market outside Europe. The SME must be registered in an EU member state, Switzerland, Iceland, Israel, Norway, Türkiye or the United Kingdom, work with a local partner, and target Africa, North or South America, Asia or Oceania. The call has €4.2 million for 70 projects.

EIT Urban Mobility is not a single open envelope. It currently has several live calls. The Financial Support to Startups call, which can provide up to €2.5 million per company by joining an active pre-seed, seed or Series A round, has its next cut-off on 16 November 2026 at 17:00 CET. The SME Market Expansion Open Call 2027 is more straightforward grant money: a €60,000 lump sum for about 10 SMEs, closing on 1 December 2026 at 17:00 CET, if an end client will test the solution. An Enhance NEB call closes on 17 November 2026, and a Strategic Innovation call on 28 January 2027. The full board is on the EIT Urban Mobility calls page.

The 2027 European Prize for Women Innovators, run by the EIC and the EIT, is open until 1 December 2026 at 17:00 CET. It is a prize, not a project grant. The Women Innovators category awards €100,000, €70,000 and €50,000; the Rising Innovators category, for women under 35, and the EIT Women Leadership category each award €50,000, €30,000 and €20,000.

How to use a list like this

The lesson from checking the original post is not that social media is a bad place to spot opportunities. It is often the fastest one. The lesson is that the official PDF still wins on the details that decide whether an application is eligible: a previous game’s sales report, a partner in a second country, a national space-agency letter, or the difference between €150,000 and €200,000.

If a deadline is next week, start with EUDIS or the 13 November AI Factories cut-off. If you sell software or connected products, the SECURE call is the most direct pot of money for Cyber Resilience Act work before Christmas. If you are building for other SMEs in cybersecurity, health, games or space, January and February are the months that will reward teams that begin the paperwork now.

This guide is a snapshot of official pages on 10 November 2026. It is not legal, financial or grant-writing advice, and it does not replace the call documents. Where two official sources disagree, we have said so.

Sources

• Kirill Svavolia, LinkedIn post listing European startup funding deadlines, via his profile
• EUDIS Business Accelerator website, Cohort 4 announcement, FAQ and application guidelines; European Commission EUDIS Business Accelerator page
• EuroHPC JU: Large Scale, Playground and Fast Lane access pages for AI Factories, and the Terms of Reference for AI Factories Access Calls for Industrial Innovation
• SECURE second open call, secure4sme.eu
• EIT, Innovation Validation Call 2027
• European Cybersecurity Competence Centre call page and Digital Europe call document DIGITAL-ECCC-2027-DEPLOY-CYBER-11
• FFplus Call-3 Type-1 announcement
• Creative Europe call document CREA-MEDIA-2027-DEVVGIM, 30 September 2026
• ESA Space Solutions, Open Call for Kick-starts and how-to-apply page
• EIC Accelerator page and EIC funding opportunities in 2027, published 5 November 2026
• Women TechEU 2 EIC active calls; RVO pages for Eurostars and Innowwide; EIT Urban Mobility call pages; EIC news on the 2027 European Prize for Women Innovators, 2 September 2026