Innovate for a sustainable and circular fashion industry
The S4Fashion Call for proposals is supported by S4Fashion-Sustainability for Fashion sector project, funded by COSME programme, under Grant Agreement 958038.
The purpose of the call for proposals is to select and provide funding and support to 25 transnational partnerships that aim at creating a new innovative product or service directly improving the take-up and adoption of sustainability and circularity models and practices in the fashion sectors.
The selected partnerships will receive direct funding of up to EUR 15.000 for their innovative projects and will also benefit from additional business support services such as training workshops, mentoring, brokerage events, and investment forums to ensure the innovative projects develop into a marketable product, service or business model.
CALL FOR PROPOSALS AIM
The S4Fashion Call for proposals is seeking innovative collaborative projects aiming to pilot novel processes to create a product, service or business model with scale-up potential for sustainable or circular fashion.
What are the benefits of the selected projects
S4Fashion offers to transform your sustainable and circular business ideas into reality through collaboration with transnational partners and be part of a the global Sustainable Fashion Ecosystem. The selected projects will get:
- 1-year tailored coaching program including:
- Personal mentor;
- Tailor made expert coaching;
- Peer to peer coaching;
- Focused training sessions;
- Financial support up to €15.000;
- Access to respected designers and fashion personalities engaged in sustainability and circular fashion
- Additional support activities:
- Networking with investors, retailers, brands and potential customers;
- Webinars with designers and fashion brands;
- Matchmaking events with ecosystem players;
- Fashion events, summits, conferences
- Access to the shared ecosystem mapping, knowledge base and community via the S4Fashion platform
- Follow-up service and help desk facility.
- 1-year tailored coaching program including:
- Personal mentor;
- Tailor made expert coaching;
- Peer to peer coaching;
- Focused training sessions;
- Financial support up to €15.000;
- Access to respected designers and fashion personalities engaged in sustainability and circular fashion
- Additional support activities:
- Networking with investors, retailers, brands and potential customers;
- Webinars with designers and fashion brands;
- Matchmaking events with ecosystem players;
- Fashion events, summits, conferences
- Access to the shared ecosystem mapping, knowledge base and community via the S4Fashion platform
- Follow-up service and help desk facility.
CALL INFORMATION SUMMARY
Total budget of the call: € 275.000
Opening date: Wednesday, 19th of May 2021
Deadline: Monday, 15th of November 2021 at 17:00 CET (Brussels time)
Number of proposals to be funded: at least 25 selected projects
Number of organisations per proposal: at least 2 organisations from at least 2 different eligible countries
Funding per proposal: € 10.000 for proposals with up to 3 partners, € 15.000 for proposals with 4 partners or more
Funding rate: 100% of eligible costs
Duration of the projects: 12 months
Type of participants: Micro, Small and Medium-sized Enterprises with proposals relevant to the fashion sectors (textiles, clothing, footwear, leather and accessories), Designers and Startups. Academia and Technology Centres are eligible only as partners.
WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW
The following eligibility criteria must be individually met:
- Lead partners and partners must be active or want to become active in sustainable or circular fashion;
- Lead partners and partners must be legally established according to the national law of an eligible EU member state or COSME associated country (Iceland, Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, North Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, Turkey, Moldova, Ukraine and Armenia) and UK and they shall meet the eligibility criteria indicated in the next article.
- Lead partners and partners must be legally established;
- Eligible lead partners and partners are: micro and small companies, designers, start-ups. Academia and technology centres can participate as partners.
- All lead partners and partners must have registered on the S4Fashion Platform and refer in the application to their (complete) company profile and (if applicable) to a product profile featuring their work of their most relevant collection.
- The same organisation can be involved in only one proposal. In case an organisation is mentioned in more than one proposal, only the first submitted project will be evaluated and all the other concerned proposals submitted will be considered ineligible under this call.
- Organisations that have already been awarded under a call for proposals published by any of the following three projects: Fashion for Change (Grant agreement number: 958039) , Circular InnoBooster (Grant agreement number: 958135) and SmallButPerfect (Grant agreement number: 958060), can participate in this call only if the project idea is completely different from the one already awarded.
- Absence of conflict of interest. Lead partners and partners shall not have any potential conflict of interest with the S4Fashion selection process. All cases of potential conflict of interest will be assessed case by case.
Failure to comply with the above eligibility requirements will lead to the rejection of the application.
The following eligibility criteria must be met by the project proposal:
- Proposals must include at least two organisations (partners), coming from at least two different eligible countries.
- Proposals must present innovative and collaborative new processes, products or services in the sectors: textiles, clothing, footwear, leather and accessories, new business models for sustainable and/or circular fashion.
- Each proposal must have a lead partner and one up to four (4) partners. The total number of partners, including the Lead partner, must not exceed five (5).
- To be considered admissible, a proposal must be:
(a) submitted in the electronic submission system (platform.s4fashion.eu) before the deadline stated in the Call;
(b) written in English language only;
(c) readable, accessible and printable;
(d) complete in all its parts;
(e) respecting the page limits and layout requirements set out in the template of the Call;
(f) including all supporting documents specified in the section Submission Procedures.
- Project activities that have already been funded or are being funded by other funding instruments will be rejected. Double funding is not allowed.
- Already existing products without a clear development or improvement or innovation beyond the state-of-art will be rejected.
Failure to comply with the above eligibility requirements will lead to the rejection of the application.
MATCHMAKING
S4Fashion provides the following tools to facilitate the interested organizations to find a partner:
- Matchmaking via S4Fashion platform https://platform.s4fashion.eu/
- Call for Proposals Info Days
SUBMISSION PROCEDURES
Proposals have to be submitted through the S4Fashion Platform https://platform.s4fashion.eu/
Applications submitted by any other means will not be considered for funding.
Each – submitted through the online platform – must include the following documents:
- Project Proposal Application Form
- Declaration on honour of the Lead Partner and all the Partners– signed and stamped by the legal representative – confirmation of the exclusion criteria; absence of conflict of interest to be accepted by the Applicant and the Partners; consent for processing of personal data (in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulation, EU2016/679)
- Creative material (e.g. video, presentation, pitch deck)
Additional material, which has not been included in the online application form, will not be considered for the evaluation of the proposals. Proposals will be evaluated as submitted. Information not included in the proposal will not be considered. The data provided will remain confidential and will only be shared within the S4Fashion Steering Board members.
The Applicants are strongly recommended not to wait until the last minute to submit the proposal. Failure of the proposal to arrive in time for any reason, including extenuating circumstances, will result in rejection of the proposal. The Applicants are solely responsible for verification of the completeness of the form.
- S4Fashion call for proposal will open on May 19th 2021
- The deadline for proposal submission is November 15th 2021.
- The pre- selected “finalist” proposals will be notified within 2 months after the closure of the call for proposals
- Pre-selected “finalist” proposals will be invited to the Pitching Day that will take place on February 2022
- The selected proposals will be notified within 2 weeks after the Pitching Day
- The finally selected projects are expected to start in May 2022.
Only proposals submitted before the deadline will be accepted. After the call closure no additions or changes to received proposals will be considered.
For further information on the Call for proposals, in case of any doubts regarding the eligibility rules, the information that is to be provided in the Application Form, or if you encountered problems with the Application Form, please contact the Helpdesk email: info@s4fashion.eu.
For technical issues please contact platfrom@s4fashion.eu.
The FAQ section will be published and updated regularly on the basis of the inquiries received.
READ THE DOCUMENTATION
1. Read the full details of the call for proposals here
2. Download the application form and the declaration on honour to successfully submit your application
STEPS TO JOINING
Join the S4Fashion platform, matchmake with other actors, find your partner, develop a new project idea and submit your application through the S4Fashion platform.
