EASME, the European Commisssion's Executive Agency for SMEs, has just published their 2014-2018 report on the EIC Accelerator pilot.

The EIC Accelerator pilot – previously known as the SME Instrument – carefully selects the best innovators in Europe and aims to bridge the critical investment gap in early-stage innovation, making the companies an ideal investment opportunity for follow-up investment from private entities. The 2019 edition of the Innovation Kitchen report presents the portfolio of successful companies emerging from Europe’s most wanted innovation funding programme for small businesses. Since the start of the programme in 2014 the EIC Accelerator pilot (SME Instrument) has helped over 4400 companies get a head start in the race to the market. The programme offers up to € 2.5 million in funding, innovation coaching and business acceleration services. More than two-thirds of the companies have placed their product on the market, since they received support from the EIC pilot. 17 companies float on the stock exchange market, 33 have been acquired and a total of € 3 billion of extra private follow-up investment has been leveraged. Over 75% of the companies funded have increased their operating revenues. Companies have also grown in size as around 67% of them have increased their headcount since the grant.

Source: EASME