While many of the project (action) types from Horizon 2020 will continue into Horizon Europe, there will be some changes to the names of the types of actions. This is to better reflect the changes made to some funding schemes.
Standard collaborative projects
The standard collaborative project types such as Research and Innovation Actions (RIA), Innovation Actions (IA), or Coordination and Support Actions (CSA) will remain virtually the same in Horizon Europe (including the reimbursement rates), although the minimum requirements for eligible consortia will be adjusted to the rules of Horizon Europe.
- Research and Innovation Actions (RIA) - Activities aiming primarily to establish new knowledge or to explore the feasibility of a new or improved technology, product, process, service or solution. This may include basic and applied research, technology development and integration, testing, demonstration and validation on a small-scale prototype in a laboratory or simulated environment.
- Innovation Actions (IA) - Activities directly aimed at producing plans and arrangements or designs for new, altered or improved products, processes or services, possibly including prototyping, testing, demonstrating, piloting, large-scale product validation and market replication.
- Coordination and Support Actions (CSA) - Activities contributing to the objectives of Horizon Europe (i.e. dissemination, awareness-raising and communication, networking, coordination, etc.), excluding R&I activities (except when undertaken under the component "Widening participation and spreading excellence" of the Work Programme "Widening participation and strengthening the European Research Area").
Rebranded types of projects
However, as some types of projects in Horizon 2020 did not fall into a specific category (i.e. most of the Marie Skłodowska Curie Actions), the European Commission decided to create a new project type for them in Horizon Europe - Training and Mobility Actions. In addition, some types of projects require new names to better reflect the changes in the funding schemes when compared to Horizon 2020. One example of this is the former SME Instrument, which was basically an Innovation Action. However, due to the changes in the scheme which require activities going beyond standard R&I projects, it will now be renamed as Innovation and Market Deployment Action.
Consequently, the new types of projects in Horizon Europe are:
- Innovation and Market Deployment Actions (IMDA) - Activities embedding an innovation action and other activities necessary to deploy an innovation in the market, including the scaling-up of companies and Horizon Europe blended finance.
- Training and Mobility Actions (TMA) - Activities geared towards the improvement of the skills, knowledge and career prospects of researchers based on mobility between countries and, if relevant, between sectors or disciplines.