"Funding for Cyber" - supporting the uptake and dissemination of state-of-the-art cybersecurity solutions by SMEs.

Context

The “Funding for Cyber” call, published by the Belgian National Coordination Centre (NCC), aims to support Belgian organisations (including start-ups, scale-ups, SMEs, and mid-caps) in adopting or developing innovative digital solutions.
The call’s theme is “Developing infrastructures or digital awareness tools that use state-of-the-art technologies to strengthen cybersecurity capabilities for SMEs.”

Goals

• Building infrastructures offering cloud computing services, free data backups, or a secure domain name system.
• Developing multi-factor authentication solutions.
• Creating AI-based cybersecurity awareness tools that use interactive learning or gamified approaches and enable users to track their progress.

Target Groups

Beneficiaries:

• private companies
• SMEs
• start-ups

End-users:

• Belgian SMEs needing cybersecurity solutions.

Eligibility

The beneficiaries should:

• Belong to an EU Member State or an EEA country
• Presents and justify estimated eligible costs of at least EUR 60000
• Have demonstrated expertise in either:
  • creating infrastructures that offer cloud computing services, free data backups and/or a reliable domain name system
  • creating multi-factor authentication solutions
  • creating IT solutions for cybersecurity awareness based on artificial intelligence, using interactive lessons and/or game-based learning techniques and allowing users to track

Funding

• The total funding available for the call is EUR 360000 €. It is divided into 6 tranches of EUR 60000 each
• The available budget will be allocated according to four criteria, each with a score of 1 to 5:
  1. Impact
  2. Availability
  3. Relevance
  4. Implementation

Eligible Costs

Actual expenses incurred and justified by the beneficiaries through their accounting documents, up to EUR 60000.

Timeline

• Opening date: 08 October 2025
• Deadline date: 08 December 2025 02:00 (Brussels time)
• The expected duration of participation: approximately 2 months, from opening of the call until December 11. The activity can have started prior and extend beyond this timeline, but only the activities within the timeline of this call are eligible