Transport and mobility services are an important part of the EU economy, accounting for at least 5% of total value added and employing approximately 10.5 million people[1].  As transport transitions to climate neutrality, it will continue to be the base of Europe’s economy. EIT Urban Mobility, an initiative of the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT), a body of the European Union, invested in more than 60 start-ups in 2022 alone. By funding solutions with a variety in mobility subsectors, European regions, and team diversity, EIT Urban Mobility accelerates the innovation needed to reach climate neutrality.

As a result, passenger mobility is undergoing major changes and shifts to new paradigms and there is growing concern about the long-term sustainability of major transportation systems, particularly those in cities. Ride hailing (23%), and ridesharing (12%)¹ are the most used new mobility services in Europe in 2022, while the electric vehicle market still a much smaller sector, is exploding. The Electric Vehicles market in Europe is projected to grow by 17.05% (2023-2027) resulting in a market volume of US$332.80bn in 2027.

Fredrik Hånell, Impact Ventures Director: “Europe leads not only in green and green-digital innovation, but also in innovation overall. To keep this up, EIT Urban Mobility boosted its investments to fund these 60 early-stage start-ups, which not only create a possible financial return but allows for us to also push for a strong focus on team and regional diversity, and environmental and social impact. European start-ups need to consider diversity and impact, to keep ahead of the curve, and defend our worldwide advantage.”

A closer look at 5 start-ups that are making an impact across Europe in electrical mobility: 

Elonroad (Sweden)

• Elonroad’s disruptive technology is the first electric road with a ground level feeding system tested in an urban environment with a city bus and other vehicles in the city of Lund. Their solution is enabling the reduction of the vehicles batteries size, making electric vehicles more sustainable and accessible and creating the most significant impact in the direct reduction of GHG emissions. 

Circu Li-Ion (Luxembourg)

• By 2030, the EU will become second in demand for batteries worldwide yet increasing the number of new batteries isn’t a sustainable option. Circu-lion is upcycling batteries for the mobility sector and maximizing the value of each lion cell and consequently reducing the need for new batteries production. Not only does their solution have a positive environmental footprint, but they are also creating a significant impact on the circular economy in the battery industry. 

Waybler (Sweden)

• Waybler is accelerating the Electric Vehicle adoption and its infrastructure. By having an intelligent load balancing and phase distribution technology, they are directly creating a positive impact in energy savings and efficiency. 

Chainge (Denmark)

• Chainge is replacing diesel vans with electric cargo bikes in last mile logistics. Due to the decrease on the number of vehicles around the city (no road congestion) and consequently massive reduction of hazardous emissions produced and air pollution, their product has a positive environmental impact. 

Inbalance Grid (Lithuania)

• Inbalance grid is focusing on electric vehicle charging with the goal of making charging available everywhere. Their cloud balancing solution improves energy efficiency as well as reduces environmental impact of cities in terms of air quality by indirectly contributing to the reduction of GHG emissions. At the same time, their solution promotes the adoption of clean technologies and reduces the material consumption/waste due to extending the grids’ lifetime.

More information about these start-ups, and our other  33 start-ups working on electrical vehicles, and the complete EIT Urban Mobility portfolio can be found: Portfolio – EIT Urban mobility 

In 2022, a staggering 87% of all VC funding in Europe continues to be raised by male-only founding teams, while the proportion of funding raised by women-only teams has dropped to 1%, according to the State of European Tech. Within EIT Urban Mobility’s portfolio, 40% of the total funding is assigned to female-led and co-led start-ups.   

More information 

By focusing on investing in all European regions, EIT Urban Mobility supports innovation to improve urban mobility and the creation of livable cities for all European citizens. Examples of these new geographical investments are Estonia (Lightcode and Fyma), Hungary (M3ter and FolderGo) and Lithuania (Walk15 and Inbalance Gri). In 2022, EIT Urban Mobility also diversified its portfolio with investments in new verticals, e.g. ConTech (Propergate), InsurTech (GoCleer), Hydrogen (Digas) and Water Mobility (Hyke and Zeabuz).  Mioo Cycling solution enables easy access to bicycle repair and maintenance, which creates a positive impact on people’s health and safety. By encouraging active mobility, they are also contributing to a positive environmental impact.  EIT Urban Mobility keeps looking for the most prominent entrepreneurs to disrupt the European mobility industry. The next open call for investments will open in March. Sign up to receive a notification when the call opens.

[1] 2022 New Mobility Patterns in European Cities Task A Final report.pdf (europa.eu)

Saying you want to become the leading impact investor in Europe in the mobility sector is one thing, proving it another. How do you define impact, and how do you measure it? Together with the Upright Project, Katapult and geoFluxus, EIT Urban Mobility has discussed this topic during a panel session at Slush 2022.  

The definition of impact 

The session kicks off with the so-called elephant in the room question “What is impact?”. While the answer often is “it depends”, Annu Nieminen, CEO of the Upright Project, is clear “It does not depend at all. We have huge amounts of science on this topic. It is an area where proper mathematics, logic and rigorous thinking has taken place for a clear definition”. Impact is not only the negative or positive effect on the environment, but also on economic, health and knowledge that are all measurable.  

Therefore, impact shouldn’t be based on personal opinions or stories. Annu: You wouldn’t take a financial story as the truth, you want data, so why take an impact story as such?”. Fredrik Hånell, Impact Venture Director at EIT Urban Mobility, continues: “When you meet an entrepreneur as an investor and you have to ask them about the impact they create, they tend to have a nice story prepared for that.  Others start by mentioning what they dream of and the change they want to achieve: All other aspects of the business have almost become secondary. The big problem we are facing is that we are often presented with a good story which doesn’t mean they also create real positive impact.”  

Even though impact should be based on data, this is not easy with early-stage companies. Jørn Haanæs, Investment Director at Katapult: “With late-stage companies you can make clear predictions, but with pre-seed companies it is still guessing on the impact. Either way, the most important question remains: can a company go from zero to one, will it work?”.  When a company is not arriving at positive financial results at some point, there won’t be any other positive impact at all. 

Adding to this perspective from a different angle, Arnout Sabbe, CEO of geoFluxus states: “I believe that the most sustainable outcome of your company should also be the most positive business outcome. If this isn’t the case and sustainability hinders your financial returns, then it is time to tweak your business model since there is something wrong with the DNA of your company.”  

Greenwashing 

Over the last years, the importance of impact has increased significantly. “Companies start to understand that they can’t solarpanel their way out of the impact question anymore. They need to change for real and become more transparent”, says Annu. Unfortunately, at the same time there is also a rise in so-called greenwashing. Arnout: “It’s not only large companies who pretend to be green, but there also exist labeling companies which you can just pay to receive a green label. What is then the value of having such a label?” 

Annu: “When we review webpages, the more we come across the word sustainability, the less impactful these companies actually are. So don’t say you are sustainable, do it and be the best at it.” This is something Arnout fully confirms: “geoFluxus has shifted its narrative from saying that it is the most sustainable way handle your waste to the easiest and quickest way. We don’t say sustainable anymore, even though the algorithm still works in the same way.”

As a result, the company now sees that also companies that are not interested in sustainability or the ones who don’t want talk about it, are onboarding their platform. “We don’t look like a hippy-washed company, it’s basically something that makes waste easier to handle and by coincidence it’s also the most sustainable solution for rest materials.” So instead of talking a lot about sustainability, simply integrating it at the core of your business works a lot better.  

The future of investing in impact startups 

Looking at the next decade, Jørn states that investing in impactful startups is the best thing as it also leads to superior financial results. “I think that impact ventures will only scale if we make it also the most profitable. We have investors in our fund that don’t care much about impact, so they get that as an extra and they can stay for the financial performance. You don’t need to only focus on impact and get stigmatized for it.”  

During this time period, Fredrik is foreseeing a change in the investment focus from software applications to hardware solutions. “While hardware will always have a negative impact due to the resources needed, they will enable technologies and solutions which will lead to a net positive impact. This implies for me that our investment thesis and the way we evaluate startups will have to change since evaluating a deep-tech startup is quite a different deal than evaluating a software company which often are seen as positively impacting.” 

Annu: “Don’t forget that also apps have an impact. They use energy, mobile devices and talented people. Especially looking at human capital, resources are now used for many not-so-necessary services and products like apps where cats make funny faces. We need to consider the opportunity cost of highly educated people which is also a limited resource. How much can we afford to use on secondary important things?” 

Accelerating the change to impact 

Climate change has been seen as something of the future, something that our grandchildren will have to witness. However, it is already happening today. Annu: “The planet doesn’t have the time to make it complicated. It doesn’t have 20 years left. As such, startups should not be filling in questionnaires about ESGs for investors. Running a company is hard enough and founders should focus on building a net positive business.” 

“Well, besides specific investments, we need policy changes with big issues to incentivize good behavior”, states Jorn. “Specially to deal with the emotional side of human nature.” 

So how do we get people to change? Jørn: “Don’t ask the people. For example, if you ask most people, they want a Tesla. Even though there are a million times more efficient ways to move people around both in cities as in rural areas. The whole point should be to let innovators do their thing and finance new projects and new experiments and then see what works.” 

Fredrik: “I would actually recommend getting rid of cars completely and having more bicycles. By reshaping cities like Barcelona with superblocks and low speed areas, we give the cities back to the citizens.” 

Arnout adds a different point of view: “I would say we need more crises. We see that only real things and systems will change after extreme disruptions. For example, with our company we now see that suddenly companies, instead of having to pay for their waste, get money for their waste materials due to the gas crisis and material shortage. This has never happened before and makes them treat waste differently.” 

Annu: “I believe that change will come slowly but surely now that it is becoming financially more profitable to run and own a company that creates more value for its surrounding world. Due to where talent wants to work, where investments want to go, what do founders really want to run. And I see this change already happening, so many cool things are accelerating and that is what I’m betting on.” 

The French start-up Urban Radar, specialised in urban transformation and sustainable city planning, has won the Greentech Innovation label. The label is issued by the French Ministry of Ecological Transition to start-ups and entrepreneurs for their commitment to green and sustainable innovation. Companies are selected based on their ability to demonstrate positive impact on sustainability goals, which is also one of the reasons why EIT Urban Mobility decided to invest in Urban Radar. 

Founded in 2019, Urban Radar is a cloud platform that is revolutionising the way cities manage and regulate their mobility. In 2020, it was selected by EIT Urban Mobility to participate in the Scale-up programme, which allowed the start-up to launch a pilot in Barcelona on curb management and urban logistics.

After this first testing, Urban Radar has decided to expand its markets to Spain. EIT Urban Mobility is glad to support this expansion by offering office space in our headquarters in Barcelona. And the start-up is off to an incredible start. During the BNEW – Barcelona New Economy Week 2022, they were awarded Best Mobility Start-up and received the prize from the Spanish Minister of transportation, Raquel Sanchez. 

Today, the start-up offers three solutions to observe local trends and make data-driven decisions to meet the needs of citizens. With Citizen’s Need they help cities placing proximity-based urbanism at the center of their policies to answer citizen’s needs. Fret impact builds an understanding of freight paters in the peri-urban logistics hubs. And Flexcurb reveals how curb space is allocated and used to highlight opportunities for improvement. 

Discover more about the solutions of Urban Radar on the EIT Urban Mobility Marketplace. 

Out of 100 applications, the Scale-up Programme has identified the 13 most promising start-ups with solutions for sustainable urban mobility. These companies will now take part in one of the two programme paths. 

Path A will focus on providing visibility. Path B is oriented towards the performance of a pilot within a European city which allows the start-up to showcase their solution in a real environment, in addition to the exposure benefits. Moreover, the programme will help all the selected start-ups to boost their business to the next level by supporting them in finding funding and partnerships through attendance at major European events, giving them visibility to potential investors and bringing them closer to implementing their solutions. 

Path A:

• me energy (Germany)
• Mioo Cycling (Sweden)
• Don Cicleto (Spain)
• Eljun (Sweden)
• Jonna (Sweden)
• Allihop (Sweden)

Path B:

• Isarsoft (Germany) – Challenge 01, raised by Hamburger Hochbahn AG: Push the transport revolution by offering customers information about the occupancy of public transport vehicles in real-time by analysing the videos of security cameras.
• CycleAI (Portugal) – Challenge 03, raised by Prague 1 Municipal District: Digital regulation: Find harmony between promoting active clean micro-mobility in cities and operating these sharing services in a way that is consistent with other users of the area.
• SHQUARED (Germany) – Challenge 04, raised by the City of Munich: Gather insights and develop a digital B2B marketplace that brings together operators of private or commercial spaces.
• Vadecity (Spain) – Challenge 06, raised by the City of Madrid: Implement safe and secured bicycle parking with the possibility of charging e-bikes, located at strategic points.
• SOLUM (Spain) – Challenge 09, raised by the City of Madrid: Implement parking and docking stations for micro-mobility (bikes, e-bikes, e-scooters) of private customers or sharing companies that need users to park or charge their devices.
• PhySens (Germany) – Challenge 11, raised by IDIADA: Design a system to be installed between the charging station and vehicle that will allow data collection, viewing, evaluation and validation of the charging process.
• Tirn Technology (Slovakia) – Challenge 14, raised by TUSGSAL: Test an innovative solution into a sample of TUGSAL’s electric vehicle to provide insights into the state-of-charge of the buses.

The Scale-up Programme will be a gateway for participant companies to make themselves known to potential investors, customers and partners by participating in key urban mobility events in Europe, such as the Future Mobility event in Berlin, Disraptor in Prague, and the Tomorrow Mobility World Congress, part of the Smart City Expo World Congress (SCEWC22), taking place in Barcelona.

In addition, the Scale-up Programme participants will receive support services worth more than €25.000 provided by the programme partners. The Scale-up Programme is financed by EIT Urban Mobility and led by CARNET, with the collaboration of PowerHub, Fraunhofer Society for the Advancement of Applied Research, UnternehmerTUM, Technische Universität Braunschweig, Niedersächsisches Forschungszentrum Fahrzeugtechnik (NFF), Digital Hub Logistics Hamburg and the City of Hamburg, Xpreneurs, UnternehmerTUM Digital Hub Mobility.

For more information about the Scale-up Programme visit https://www.eiturbanmobility.eu/business-creation/scale-up-programme/ 

HOPU (HOP Ubiquitous), one of EIT Urban Mobility’s first equity startups, has been acquired by Libelium. With its Internet of Things (IoT) solutions for monitoring air quality, noise pollution, and meteorological parameters, HOPU makes a good match with Libelium, a leading company in the design and manufacturing of wireless sensor network devices to deliver reliable IoT, M2M and smart cities solutions. The high compatibility of both companies stands for a huge leap forward in their strategy to lead the IoT market, with the intention to float the company in an initial public offering. 

Since its starting point in 2014, the Spanish venture HOPU has grown to a 40 staff company, working with over 100 cities and customers, and has more than 700 devices deployed in Europe. With the data provided by HOPU, cities get insights and suggestions on how to transform their urban spaces to create more sustainable living areas. For these reasons, EIT Urban Mobility decided to invest in HOPU in 2020. Over the years, HOPU has taken part in several of our programmes, like the Scale up programme in 2020 and Raptor in 2021, where they were the winning startup for the air quality challenge of the city of Sant Joan Despí, Spain.  

HOPU is highly competitive in their sector and has positioned itself as a valuable collaborator for large partners such as Telefónica, Suez and Signify (Philips). Besides enriching Libelium’s technological portfolio and know-how on Smart Cities, Infrastructure and Sustainability, it gives the opportunity to HOPU to expand its market outside of Europe to Central and North America.  

This successful transaction solidifies the commitment of EIT Urban Mobility towards urban mobility transformation powered by data and digitization. 

EIT Urban Mobility just opened an ongoing investment call for early-to-seed stage ventures. Selected scale-ups and start-ups can receive up to €500,000 capital. More importantly, the offer goes beyond funding. Ventures will benefit from fast-track introductions into the urban mobility community via the extensive regional and pan-European network, including cities, mentors, and industry leaders. This allows start-ups to validate their solutions, network with key decision-makers and scale their company with increased visibility.

The current portfolio contains companies developing technologies and solutions which are shaping the future of the urban mobility landscape. While financial return is essential, as an impact investor EIT Urban Mobility selects ventures where social and environmental impact grows with revenue. Start-ups in EIT Urban Mobility’s equity portfolio contribute positively to at least one of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) related to sustainable cities and communities, clean energy, and climate action. Based on the call for actions related to these goals, EIT Urban Mobility is linking key performance indicators to the expected impact of the start-ups to indicate their contribution to improved sustainable and liveable cities.

In addition, EIT Urban Mobility focuses on inclusive and gender-balanced teams when selecting start-ups. Research indicates that new businesses led by women are more likely to succeed and more likely to exceed expectations for growth. Since EIT Urban Mobility made inclusive and gender-balanced teams a key priority in 2020, internal reports show that the number of female-led ventures in the EIT Urban Mobility portfolio has grown from 16% to 27%, and the share of gender-balanced start-up investments has risen from 28% to 52%.  

Finally, to stimulate the talent and entrepreneurial mindset in all of Europe, EIT Urban Mobility pays special attention to start-ups incorporated in the Regional Innovation Scheme (RIS), where conservative and risk-avoiding policymaking can slow down change and innovation. 

For more information about the investment call: EIT Urban Mobility Startup Investments – EIT Urban mobility 

Out of the 244 applications, 62 startups were selected to participate in the five thematic accelerator programmes of EIT Urban Mobility. With their wide variance of innovative ideas, the startups aim to solve challenges regarding sustainable city logistics, urban air mobility, e+mobility, energy and public realm, and 5G technologies. Together they represent various mobility subsectors – from cybersecurity and software-based products enhancing connectivity and autonomy, to hardware that shapes and visually changes the public realm.

In the next six months, the startups will receive support and training via our partner run accelerator programmes. Among other offerings, the programmes include personalised business coaching, access to investment initiatives and funding instruments, and participation in the EIT Urban Mobility community of pan-European cities, corporates, and sister organisations. 

All startups contribute to the goal of EIT Urban Mobility to have a sustainable impact while creating more liveable cities. Furthermore, they cover all European regions by coming from 20 countries. Below, grouped per accelerator programme, you can find the full list of participating ventures.

5G Turbo 

The 5G TURBO Accelerator will support 20 startups working on 5G technologies and connectivity services so that they develop technologies in the field of urban mobility. The selected startups are: 

• AD Knight 
• Andronebula SL 
• Cezigue 
• DotDot S.A.S. 
• EOS Smart Connectivity S.L 
• EVOURBE SL 
• ITC Intelligent Traffic Control LTD. 
• Lokit Technology srl 
• Longship IT Solutions B.V. 
• Meredot 
• Motoblockchain 
• OtoRobotics sp z o.o. 
• PANTOhealth 
• Park4Dis 
• roboGaze 
• Runvido 
• SCOOBIC URBAN MOBILITY SL 
• Social Tech Projects ApS 
• YourParking 
• ZenParking Smart Parking 

This programme is run by: NextMove, Carnet, CTAG, Niedersächsisches Forschungszentrum Fahrzeugtechnik, Mobile World Capital Barcelona and FundingBox.  

E+ Mobility 

The E+ Mobility Accelerator has a specific focus on mobility & energy, micro-mobility, and shared mobility thematic fields to introduce these startups-led solutions in the market. 

• BAVERTIS 
• CityQ AS  
• DeepDrive GmbH 
• Deftpower B.V. 
• fronyx GmbH 
• Gocleer 
• Hergele Mobility 
• Honeycomb Network Ltd 
• Hydrogen First Sp zoo 
• VI&GO 
• Zentrack Ltd (t/a Luna Systems) 
• Zipforce AB 

The partners of this programme are Barcelona Activa, Carnet, CERTH, Connected Mobility Hub, CTAG, ENEA, Ferrovial, UPC and Universitat Pompeu Fabra.  

Energy and Public Realm 

The Accelerator provides support for innovative mobility solutions, focusing on creating a better public space and improving the wellbeing of residents by addressing energy- and mobility-related aspects. 

• Famous Crusade – UNIPESSOAL LDA 
• Greenele Oy 
• IO-Dynamics GmbH 
• Karikrea SL 
• Levante 
• MinervaS s.r.l. 
• MissCar 
• RoMobility
• Tirn Technology s.r.o. 
• velow 

The programme partners are ZONE Cluster, PowerHUB and SpinLab Accelerator.  

Sustainable City Logistics 

This programme is for startups facing the challenges of creating more sustainable freight and goods transportation in cities and overall sustainability in city logistics. 

• Everimpact  
• Fast Trek 
• Mily Technologies 
• MOBIQU 
• NeWay 
• Optiyol 
• pickshare 
• RiDERgy GmbH 
• Sensorita AS 
• tOURmix Delivery Bt. 

The consortium consists of: FutureBox, Technion Drive Accelerator, Technische Universität München, UnternehmerTum, Isbak, PoliHub, and AZO.  

UAM Plazza 

With a consortium made of international company experts in the field of mobility, aeronautics and developing urban air mobility as well as the city of Toulouse, the UAM Plazza Accelerator programme is looking for startups in urban air mobility. 

• AldoraTech 
• Cargo Drone
• DELIVRONE
• eMagic Aircraft GmbH 
• Finova Aviation
• Fusion Engineering 
• H2 DRON ENERGY; S.L 
• OmniOpti
• Sorair Technologies 
• Weslax GmbH 

The consortium partners are Toulouse Metropole, Aerospace Valley, Carnet and Ferrovial.  

To follow the progress and results of the programmes, connect to our social media channels. In case of interest to apply for the next open call for the accelerator programmes, please register here. 

How do we design our urban spaces to be and feel safer? It’s not as simple as installing cameras everywhere to watch over everyone. In this episode, our wonderful host Brittany Atkins chats with expert guests Marianne Weinreich, Debbie Dekkers, and Dan Campsall about how the presence (or absence) of safety in mobility and urban planning can be affected by gender, age, lifestyle, and more.

Marianne Weinreich is a Market Manager of Smart Mobility at Ramboll, a Danish (but international) engineering and design consultancy that aims to create sustainable solutions across transport. She has spent the last 20+ years working in mobility as a consultant and manager, and is also the co-founder and chairman of the Cycling Embassy.

Debbie Dekkers is a Programme Manager and “innovatiemanager” at the Innovation Office for the city of Amsterdam. The organisation aims to make the city more efficient and evolved for the benefit of its residents, using the power of technology to prepare for future mobility. As a programme manager, Debbie works mainly within smart mobility with a focus on MaaS, trends analysis, and anticipating new mobility concepts.

Dan Campsall is the Chairman of Agilysis, a transport behaviour and safety consultancy, with the goal to transform lives through healthier and safer communities via intelligent solutions. He also is the Vice-Chair of the Parliamentary Advisory Council for transport safety in the UK, and has been involved in the transport safety sector of mobility for about 20 years.

This episode delves into the complex subject that is safety in urban design and urban mobility, and examines it from a variety of different angles and perspectives.

A main theme our guest spoke on was how safety and the perception of safety in urban mobility can vary based on a number of demographics – Marianne spoke about how automotive safety features are structured to accommodate the average man, leaving women out of the safety equation. Debbie notes how not all urban infrastructure bears in mind the elderly or the disabled, who might need longer time and digital assistance at crosswalks and complex road crossings. Dan also commented how minorities and those living in deprived communities can be at greater risk of road injury, as well as facing lower quality infrastructure. However, they all note that there is still a sense of excitement and ambition as newer, smarter technology and strategy come to light as  solutions to these existing issues.

This is just the surface, and there are so many more levels of discussion and conversation on this episode – that we are proud to sponsor. You can hear the full discussion on Apple Podcasts, as well as anywhere else you find your podcasts.

We welcome Supernovas, the new programme that thrives for an entrepreneurial ecosystem with more women!

Supernovas is EIT Urban Mobility’s new programme that, along with EIT Manufacturing and EIT Food, has the ultimate goal of increasing the presence and role of women in the EU entrepreneurship ecosystem. Participants in this programme will have access to financial support, training and networking opportunities.

This initiative has been carefully designed to tackle the existent gender-gap and reaching a balance amongst the key pieces of the ecosystem. To do so, we have built a set of activities to unleash the female potential by identifying groups of women of different ages, backgrounds and aspirations, and supporting them with specific initiatives to enter and scale positions in the ecosystem.

The programme is included within the Strategic Synergies EIT Community cluster, which has been created by EIT to support the EU’s mission to build a healthy, sustainable and inclusive Europe.

Interested in joining? Check all the information related to the activities and open calls here.

As part of Supernovas, the Rocket-up programme has opened a call for female-led startups to support their access to new European regions. Ten startups will be selected to participate in the activities, which will promote international outreach and sales to the most innovative ventures. The deadline for the call is 19 June 2022.

Gender balance in the entrepreneurial ecosystem has been historically poor with male founders accounting for most successful international companies. Accessing new markets can be more difficult for women due to normally having fewer connections. Through activities like Rocket-up we support ventures to achieve growth, as part of our compromise to reach gender balance in the European startup ecosystem.

Rocket-up is a 3-month programme that supports women-led startups in accessing a new country or region by connecting them with experts and networking opportunities all around Europe. We seek mature startups based in the EU or EU related countries, that add to the Sustainable Development Goals and address challenges related with EIT Urban Mobility, EIT Manufacturing or EIT Food focus areas.

The programme offers:

• Internationalisation squad: Tailored and individual mentoring with three handpicked local experts for a new market entry
• Organised mission: Introductions with potential stakeholders of the preferred target city
• Online group events: Four online events with training activities, successful female entrepreneurs as speakers and opportunities for networking and connection with other entrepreneurial women.
• EIT pan-European network: Access to the EIT network (including European cities, industries partners, investors) and financial opportunities
• Visibility: More visibility of the startups through EIT communication channels as an EIT Community supported venture

The programme is held inside Supernovas, a project of EIT Food, EIT Urban Mobility and EIT Manufacturing, that aspires to promote a more gender balance entrepreneurial ecosystem. Applications are done via AwardsForce.

The Scale up programme, financed by EIT Urban Mobility, opened up a call to identify the 12 most promising startups with solutions for sustainable urban mobility. The programme aims to take the selected startups to the next level by helping them find funding and partnerships through attendance at major European events, giving them visibility to potential investors, and bringing them closer to implementing their solutions in real environments. The application period is open until 12 June 2022.

The programme supports the startups in the introduction of their solutions to the market through two different paths.

Path A: will provide international growth to startups with attendance at high-impact events, networking opportunities, increased visibility, and additional services valued at 25.000€ to 5 selected startups.

Path B: includes the benefits of path A and aims to implement seven pilots with industry and city partners with the opportunity of being funded up to 50.000€ by EIT Urban Mobility.

When applying for path B, participating startups have the opportunity to solve one of the 15 challenges raised by top European cities and industry companies from the urban mobility sector. The startups will get support from the public authorities and organisations that have raised the challenges, and from the consortium members developing the Scale up programme.

The Scale up programme is led by CARNET, with the collaboration of PowerHub, Fraunhofer Society for the Advancement of Applied Research, UnternehmerTUM, Technische Universität Braunschweig, Niedersächsisches Forschungszentrum Fahrzeugtechnik (NFF), Digital Hub Logistics Hamburg and the City of Hamburg, Xpreneurs, UnternehmerTUM Digital Hub Mobility.

For more information about the Scale up programme, the description of the challenges, and to apply for the programme, visit https://www.eiturbanmobility.eu/business-creation/scale-up-programme/

Urban Mobility went through unexpected and momentous changes in 2020 and 2021. COVID-19 ripped through our nations and cities bringing individual, community and societal upheaval and turmoil. Density and proximity, the very two things that make our cities the economic, cultural, intellectual, political, and innovative beating hearts of our society, were also the weakest points when faced with a new and deadly threat.

It has been an unforgettable couple of years that have shaped our thinking on where EIT Urban Mobility needs to go. We learned we could move fast and innovate at pace. We learned that the right thinkers and doers are out there – they just need to be found. We learned that innovation can be financially beneficial and contribute to sustainable growth.

In 2022, we want to provide momentum and support innovators further into the early stages of market uptake, and simultaneously help cities address their sustainability challenges in mobility with innovative approaches. Reducing the time-to-market of successfully piloted innovations and overcoming market-entry barriers is at the core of the objectives of this call for solutions. The post-covid urban mobility landscape leaves us limited time to reach our collective 2030 goals, and a true decade of action is needed to implement change in cities.

We look forward to receiving your applications!

Main features of the call (aim and challenges)

The overall purpose of the Factory programme is to resolve challenges facing European cities to improve citizens’ lives, by taking innovative ideas and putting them to the test in real life.

The Factory programmes helps all type and size of enterprises grow their successful business ventures and scale up their products and services. It does so by providing co-funding and opportunities for networking.

This #ChallengeMyCity call aims at resolving mobility-related challenges faced by European cities in their urban environment with market-ready innovative solutions. This year’s issue of the call is dedicated to the city of Madrid and project proposals are invited to address at least one of these 3 different Challenges:

• Challenge A – in Madrid: Logistics hub for green last mile delivery
• Challenge B – in Madrid: Safety for bicycle paths & monitoring of cyclist flows
• Challenge C – in Madrid: Monitoring active mobility flows in new urban spaces

Contact details

Events-Webinars

Here you can find the link to the Info Day webinar that will take place on the 6 May at 11:00 CEST: https://eiturbanmobility-eu.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_ha9T7730SPCdgz83IHRaRw

You can check here the presentation used in the Info Day webinar.

Call summary