Enterprise Ireland  is an Irish government’s enterprise development agency that invests and supports Irish-owned companies to grow and scale. Enterprise Ireland supports over 4,000 Irish companies creating opportunities across every region and county in Ireland to achieve greater scale and become leaders in their field across a wide range of sectors. Relevant sectors include climate, sustainability and agritech; high tech construction and housing; digital technology; engineering; life sciences; fintech, financial and business services; food and beverage; retail, customer and online; materials, print and packaging.

What is the Enterprise Ireland RD&I fund?  

Enterprise Ireland offers equity investments and tailored grants for businesses throughout their growth journey. From research and innovation, to employment and sustainability, Enterprise Ireland’s range of funding and grants enables businesses to grow and become more productive. One of the instruments is the RD&I Fund.

The aims of the RD&I Funding programme are to incentivise company investment in new products or services, and to encourage the implementation of process and organisational innovations, to increase the innovative marketed products and enhance the global competitiveness of the Irish industry. The RD&I Fund also supports the development of advanced manufacturing or development processes involving technical uncertainty and capability building of RD&I skills within Irish companies, to enable the development of new products, processes, and services. 

This directed support provides multiple benefits to the Nation including:

• An increased number of companies performing effective RD&I 
• Increasing the scale of the investment in RD&I in Ireland 
• Growth at European and international level by reaching international norms for RD&I investment and through partnerships and collaborative research programmes.
• More effective leveraging of products and services offered by companies through innovation at a business level through the implementation of new delivery methods or new business models. 

The RD&I fund covers up to 60% of the project budget depending on the company size and inclusion of collaboration. Maximal grant rates in absence of a collaboration are 45%, 35% and 25% for small, medium and large enterprises, respectively. When including collaborations within the proposed project, maximal grant rates can increase to 60%, 50% and 40%, respectively. For large enterprises, an effective cross-border collaboration or a collaboration with at least one SME is required. Built To Innovate projects have a maximum project value of €500k.

Who is eligible to apply for the Enterprise Ireland RD&I fund?

Projects are open to existing and potential Enterprise Ireland, Údarás na Gaeltachta and Local Enterprise Office (LEO) clients, subject to the prevailing policies of those agencies and must be approved for submission by an assigned Enterprise Ireland Development Advisor before proceeding with the application. Eligible Local Enterprise Office clients and eligible Údarás na Gaeltachta clients must employ a minimum of 5 Full Time Staff in Ireland at the time of application. 

In order to be eligible for funding the following criteria apply:

• Companies must operate in the manufacturing or internationally traded services areas of the business, and be either currently trading internationally or trading internationally within the short term. Some companies are exempt from this export requirement (e.g., domestically traded services companies that operate in the residential construction sector who are eligible under Built To Innovate, an Enterprise Ireland action under Housing for All). 
• All companies submitting an application for RD&I support must be EBITDA (Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation, and Amortization) positive in the previous accounting period, or EBITDA positive for at least the previous nine months prior to application and can demonstrate sustainable future EBITDA-positivity. 
• Enterprise Ireland start-up clients who have received High Potential Start-Up (HPSU) investment funding are typically not eligible for RD&I funding for a period of three years after the date of investment. Eligible HPSU clients must employ a minimum of 5 Full Time Staff in Ireland, have achieved sustainable revenues of €500,000, and are EBITDA positive in the previous accounting period, or for at least the previous nine months prior to application, and can demonstrate sustainable future EBITDA, and in the previous 6 months and during the course of the business plan the company has not raised external finance in the form of equity.
• Applicants must not be classified as an Undertaking in Difficulty under EU State Aid rules at the time of application.

The applicants can be either established companies, two or more companies that are collaborating, or companies that are part of a consortium within Europe (e.g., Eureka). 

If the collaboration is between companies of different countries, only the proposed RD&I costs of the Irish companies are considered eligible for support.

RD&I Fund and the Housing for All offer

The RD&I Fund is compatible with the Housing for All plan, announced by the Government in September 2021. This plan aims at providing productivity, innovation and research support to the domestic residential construction industry. 

In addition to the established eligibility criteria for the RD&I Fund, the offer is also open to Irish companies who employ 10 or more full time people equivalents working in homebuilding and can demonstrate an ability to deliver on the objectives of this fund. This includes, but is not limited to contractors, builder developers, sub-contractors,  Modern Methods of Construction (MMC) manufacturing companies.  Excluded from this offer are property developers who do not self-perform any construction work and companies that currently derive less than 20% of annual revenue from the homebuilding sector and do not have a validated plan to achieve this objective. Large companies that may have less than 20% revenue derived from homebuilding can be considered if they are capable of delivering substantial numbers of units. 

Companies that are operating in the coal or steel sector; that are active in the primary agricultural, fishery or aquaculture sectors; or enterprises that include or relate to activities to the gambling sector, adult entertainment or tobacco products, do not qualify. 

Qualifying applicants are exempt from the requirement of being an existing or potential client of Enterprise Ireland, Údarás na Gaeltachta or any of the Local Enterprise Offices to avail of the RD&I Fund. 

What activities and costs are eligible for RD&I funding?

The proposed RD&I activities need to be aimed at the development of the new products or services that must involve the resolution of some technical challenges, be non-routine, and/or represent a ‘step-up’ for the company in terms of the level of RD&I capability. Technically, RD&I Project activities must fall within one or more of the following categories; either industrial research and/or experimental development. Both types of research  are defined, as set out in the General Block Exemption Regulation (GBER), in the box.

‘Industrial research’ means the planned research or critical investigation aimed at the acquisition of new knowledge and skills for developing new products, processes or services or aimed at bringing about a significant improvement in existing products, processes or services, including digital products, processes or services, in any area, technology, industry or sector (including, but not limited to, digital industries and technologies, such as super-computing, quantum technologies, block chain technologies, artificial intelligence, cyber security, big data and cloud technologies). Industrial research comprises the creation of components parts of complex systems, and may include the construction of prototypes in a laboratory environment or in an environment with simulated interfaces to existing systems as well as of pilot lines, when necessary for the industrial research and notably for generic technology validation.

‘Experimental development’ means acquiring, combining, shaping and using existing scientific, technological, business and other relevant knowledge and skills with the aim of developing new or improved products, processes or services, including digital products, processes or services, in any area, technology, industry or sector (including, but not limited to, digital industries and technologies, such as for example super-computing, quantum technologies, block chain technologies, artificial intelligence, cyber security, big data and cloud or edge technologies). This may also encompass, for example, activities aiming at the conceptual definition, planning and documentation of new products, processes, or services. Experimental development may comprise prototyping, demonstrating, piloting, testing and validation of new or improved products, processes, or services in environments representative of real-life operating conditions where the primary objective is to make further technical improvements on products, processes or services that are not substantially set. This may include the development of a commercially usable prototype or pilot which is necessarily the final commercial product, and which is too expensive to produce for it to be used only for demonstration and validation purposes. Experimental development does not include routine or periodic changes made to existing products, production lines, manufacturing processes, services, and other operations in progress, even if those changes may represent improvement. 

Market-led research, consumer focus panels, and clinical trials (phase I and II & III) are eligible activities for funding, provided that the results are required for product or process development and will not be used solely for gauging the consumer’s reaction to the products. Projects focused solely on market-led research, consumer focus panels, and/or consumer reaction to products are not eligible.

In order to be eligible the project must not start prior to the application submission to Enterprise Ireland, and should begin within six months of the formal approval, otherwise approval may be withdrawn. 

Eligible cost categories vary depending on how the project budget is presented and how the overheads are calculated, but can include salaries, technical consultancy, contractual research, certification/clinical trials, patent costs, equipment rental, capital equipment (depreciated) and materials. As the fund aims to strengthen Ireland’s and the company’s internal RD&I capability and capacity, there are some restrictions on the use of the funds: 

• The majority of the project must be carried out in Ireland. Therefore, the assessment criteria will require an analysis of cost incurred in the State vs. outside the State. 
• Sourcing more than 50% of the materials for the RD&I project in another State and/or carrying out more than 50% of the subcontract RD&I work in another State represents a breach of the legal and policy requirements.  

Does your company fit the eligibility criteria?  Contact our team today to request a free consultation to discuss how we can help you to secure Enterprise Ireland RD&I funding.