Open calls for grants from EU funds

An open call for proposals for grants (''Call'') under the Operational Programme Human Resources Development 2007-2013 (''OP''), by the Ministry of Labour and Pension System, is opened until 01 October 2014.

The tender is opened for small and medium enterprises, crafts, civil society organizations, support institutions for businesses, local governments, regional (municipal) governments, local / regional public institutions in order to raise the quality of professional education and training, adopt entrepreneurial competencies, promote an entrepreneurial culture in society, development of a positive attitude towards lifelong learning in entrepreneurship for growth and development of entrepreneurship as a result and to increase the rate of self-employment and employment. Call for proposals is EU co-financed, from the European Social Fund, and, to a lesser extent, the State budget.

The total allocated funds amount to HRK 18.023.000,00 with the range of requested co-funding for the project of HRK 30.000 - HRK 300.000.

The incentive under this Call for project applications will be provided for two types of projects and will therefore be divided into two groups:

1. Education of entrepreneurs and craftsmen and
2. Promotion of entrepreneurship and crafts.

Eligible activities for project applications are therefore divided as follows:

(1) Education of entrepreneurs and craftsmen

• Training for special professional / entrepreneurial skills to small and medium enterprises, employees in the sector of small and medium enterprises, craftsmen and employees in crafts;
• Training of entrepreneurs, craftsmen and their employees (professional training, repairer professions, retraining, professional training, seminars and courses conducted by adult education institutions aimed at developing entrepreneurial and professional competence)

(2) Promotion of entrepreneurship and crafts

• Activities associated with the promotion of crafts;
• The activities associated with promoting and encouraging the creation of an entrepreneurial culture (co-funding competitions, festivals, fairs, student unions and student enterprises, co-financing student entrepreneurial incubators)

For both project groups also the activities associated with the management and implementation of project and activities related to public information and visibility are acceptable.

Final deadline for the project proposals under this Call is 01 October 2014 (until 15:30) which should be delivered to address the Croatian Employment Service.

Tender for “The application of information and communication technologies to improve business processes” had been re-opened until 30 June 2015 or until full utilization of allocated funds

On 01 September 2014 Ministry of Entrepreneurship and Crafts reopened the call for proposals for “The application of information and communication technologies (“ICT”) to improve business processes” (“Call”), under the Operational Programe for Regional Competitiveness 2007-2013, co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund.

The Call is open until 30 June 2015 or until full utilization of allocated funds and it is opened for small and medium sized businesses and crafts. The total funding available under this tender amount to HRK 34.679.375,00 with the range of requested co-funding for the project of HRK 150.000,00 and the highest HRK 750.000,00.

Eligible projects are investments that include one or more of the following activities:

• Analysis of existing business processes and the possibility of introducing ICT solutions to improve business processes, both internal (such as the computerization of storage), and those processes that extend beyond the boundaries of the enterprise (such as supply chain management and customer relationship management);
• Acquisition, development and implementation of ICT solutions for the computerization of the analysed business processes;
• Introduction of individual ICT solutions for specific business processes;
• Introduction of holistic ICT solutions for business integration of the entire company;
• Training employees to work with the new ICT system/s;
• Exploiting the possibilities of broadband solutions, such as e-learning and e-commerce.

Following grant schemes are announced for the last quarter of 2014 (as open invitations i.e. until full utilisation of allocated funds):

1. For investment in improving existing technologies and developing new products, processes and/or services;
2. Support businesses in meeting the standards and certifying products in order to increase competitiveness and access to international markets;
3. Support the creation of advanced business infrastructure and related advanced business services offered to entrepreneurs, as well as improving the quality of such infrastructure and services;
4. Application of information and communication technologies to improve business processes

For further information and assistance with applying to tenders, please contact: Nikolina Modrovčić , E: nikolina.modrovcic@cms-rrh.com