“Strengthening the Establishment and Operation of New Small and Medium Enterprises”: 3rd amendment of the Call for Action

The third (3rd) amendment of the Call for submitting funding applications to the Action “Strengthening the Establishment and Operation of New Small and Medium Enterprises”, of the program, has been published. “Competitiveness 2021/27” according to which the deadline for online submission of funding applications is Friday set 22.03.2024 and time 15:00, from 29.02.23 which was in effect.

Also in the annex the REQUIRED SUBMISSION/JOINING DOCUMENTATION, in point 14 in Chapter “CLASS A BENEFICIARIES: UNDER ESTABLISHMENT” and respectively point 14 in Chapter “CLASS B BENEFICIARIES: NEW INSTITUTIONS” the following paragraph is amended:

“Bank statements stating: a) the available balances of the
partners/shareholders’ accounts on the last day of the previous month before the date of the
electronic submission of the financing application and b) the average available balances of one of the
three previous months (whichever the investor chooses) before the month of submitting the
financing application. The amount accepted is the smaller of the two above. The
date of available balances should be the same for all bank statements for
all partners/shareholders.”

The Action concerns the strengthening of investment plans under establishment and newly incorporated businesses SMEs (except the KAD of retail, retail and tourism), which will invest own resources in the activity they intend to carry out and will create new jobs employment.

See the 3rd amendment to the Invitation here.

Program Budget

The Action will be implemented with resources from the Competitiveness Program of the NSRF 2021 – 2027 a total of €190,000,000 for the entire country. 

The minimum and maximum total supported budget (P/Y) of the business financing application is set from €30,000 up to €400,000.

The Action is co-financed by the European Union, in particular by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and by the Greek State.

Subsidy amount

The minimum and maximum total supported budget (P/Y) of the business financing application is set from €30,000 up to €400,000.

The grant will amount to 45% of the submitted expenses.

The subsidy percentage of businesses may be increased by:

  • 10% if the investment is made in a remote or fire-prone or flood-prone area or small islands and
  • Additional 5% upon reaching the employment target of at least 1 EME, in the first year after the completion of the investment

The grant amount can reach up to 200,000 euros.

The business aid of this Action will be allocated in the context of Regulation (EU) no.1407/2013 of the Commission of 18 December 2013 regarding the application of articles 107 and 108 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union to aid of minor importance (De Minimis).

Subsidized expenses

The BASIC categories of eligible expenses of businesses are as follows:

  • Buildings, Facilities and Environment
  • Production and Mechanical equipment
  • Equipment for Environmental Protection and Energy Saving
  • Circular economy equipment
  • Digital Office Equipment
  • Other Business Equipment
  • Means of Transport (Mandatory electric vehicles)
  • Software and software program licenses
  • Construction of website, eshop, mobile applications as fixed assets
  • Software/Application installation, configuration services – User training
  • Software supply/use services under a “Software as a Service”, “cloud computing” or other similar regime
  • Expenses for Provision of Services
  • Advertising, Promotion & Networking Expenses
  • Technical Studies
  • Consulting Services
  • Indirect costs (up to 7% of the eligible direct costs of the investment plan)