Open topic on research and innovation for effective management of EU external borders that promotes fundamental rights and EU values

Expected outcomes

• Projects should contribute to all of the expected outcomes.
• For each outcome (EO1), name who will use or adopt your results (a specific group, not “industry” or “society”), how they get them, and the indicator that shows the change, with baseline, target and date.
• Use the topic's own words for each outcome, so the evaluator can tick it off.

What the scope asks for

Evaluators check the proposal against these sentences of the scope. Answer each one visibly, in the call's own words.

• “Adapted to the nature, scope, type and target TRL of proposed projects, proposals should convincingly explain how they will plan and/or carry out demonstration, testing and validation of developed tools and solutions.”
• “Proposals should be convincing in explaining the methods they intend to use for demonstrating, testing and validating the proposed tools and solutions ensuring that the intersectional perspectives of diverse groups, including gender, sex, age, disabilities, race or ethnicity, sexual orientation and migrant status are integrated and considered.”
• “Proposals should also delineate the plans to develop possible future follow-up research and development and/or uptake, upscaling and/or application and use at national and EU level as possible next steps after the research project.”
• “Research proposals should consider, build on if appropriate and not duplicate previous research, including but is not limited to research by other Framework Programmes’ projects.”

Conditions that shape the proposal

• Part B, sections 1–3: 45 pages (standard application form). Text beyond the limit is not read; tables and figures count.
• Lump sum: the budget is fixed per work package and paid when each work package is completed. Every work package needs activities and deliverables an evaluator can verify, and the effort must match the money.
• TRL: the topic expects TRL 4–5 by the end of the project. State where you start and the evidence for it.
• Other Eligible Conditions: “Subject to restrictions for the protection of European communication networks.”
• Other Eligible Conditions: “The following additional eligibility criteria apply: This topic requires the active involvement, as beneficiaries, of at least 2 Border, Coast Guard or Customs Authorities from at least 2 different EU Member States or Associated countries. For these participants, applicants must fill in the table “Eligibility…”

Impact pathway and traps

• Users or citizens are part of the scope. Show how they take part in the design and testing, not only that they are informed.
• The scope expects pilots or demonstration. Name the sites, the partners who run them and what is measured there.
• International cooperation is part of the scope. Explain what the non-EU partners add and how the cooperation is organised.
• The gender dimension is named in the topic. Show how sex and gender analysis enters the research content, not only team balance.
• Keep outputs, outcomes and impacts apart: what you deliver, what changes when others use it, and the long-term effect.
• For each destination impact you claim, show which of your outcomes feeds it. Destination impacts are long-term effects, not project deliverables.
• Name the barriers outside the project (regulation, markets, user behaviour) that could block uptake, and what you will do if they do.
• Section 2.3 (the summary canvas) is optional on this call; the old split into scientific, economic and societal impact is no longer required.