“Over 1,000 domestic businesses will receive support for research, development and innovation from the HUF 53 billion budget of the new schemes, as it is a strategic goal to actively involve as many Hungarian operators in the renewing innovation ecosystem as possible,” Dr. Zoltán Birkner, President of the NRDI Office pointed out. He added: the new calls affect all members of the domestic innovation chain.

• With its HUF 12 billion budget, SME Start is a completely new funding scheme designed to involve those micro and small enterprises in the innovation ecosystem that have never won funding for such purposes.
• The call titled Support for market-driven RDI projects provides over HUF 40 billion in total to enterprises and large companies for creating new, marketable products or services with genuine scientific or technical novelty independently or in collaboration with research institutions.
• Domestic and international protection of intellectual property is encouraged for the better utilisation of such assets. The new call includes many new elements compared to the one announced in 2015. A remarkable example is flat-rate accounting, which is introduced to reduce the administrative burden.
• The fourth funding scheme supports Hungarian students studying in foreign universi-ties to participate in internship programmes in Hungary. Talented students enrolled in a higher education institution in the UK, Germany or Austria can take part in subsidised summer internship programmes at Hungarian businesses and the research teams of higher education institutions and research institutes to get involved in Hungarian research and innovation. This way the call promotes the supply of researchers.

The approved budget of the NRDI Fund for 2020 is HUF 145 billion, of which more than HUF 62 billion will be disbursed to the beneficiaries this year. The remaining amount is disbursed according to the progress of the funded projects.

Budapest, 29 May 2020