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HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-DIGITAL-EMERGING-01
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Center graph on this topic →Both topics ask for the development of networks of excellence in AI. HORIZON-RAISE-2026-01-01 is from the "AI for science" pillar of RAISE, thus focusing on AI for another scientific research field, while HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-DIGITAL-EMERGING-01 is from the "science for AI" pillar or RAISE, thus focusing on scientific excellence for AI research.
CSA under HORIZON-CL4-INDUSTRY-2025-01-DIGITAL-62 will support the overall efforts of the RAISE initiative. HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-DIGITAL-EMERGING-01 is part of that initiative and might like to dedicate resources to interacting with the CSA.
Both topics ask for the development of networks of excellence in AI. HORIZON-RAISE-2026-01-01 is from the "AI for science" pillar of RAISE, thus focusing on AI for another scientific research field, while HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-DIGITAL-EMERGING-01 is from the "science for AI" pillar or RAISE, thus focusing on scientific excellence for AI research.
Proposals under HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-DIGITAL-EMERGING-01 are expected to allocate tasks for cohesion activities with the CSA HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-18.
The new AI networks of excellence under HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-DIGITAL-EMERGING-01 might like to build on the results of previously funded AI NoE under HORIZON-CL4-2021-HUMAN-01-03.
The new AI networks of excellence under HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-DIGITAL-EMERGING-01 might like to build on the results of previously funded AI NoE under HORIZON-CL4-2021-DIGITAL-EMERGING-01-12.
The new AI networks of excellence under HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-DIGITAL-EMERGING-01 might like to build on the results of previously funded AI NoEs under ICT-48-2020.
The new AI networks of excellence under HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-DIGITAL-EMERGING-01 might like to build on the results of previously funded AI NoEs under HORIZON-CL4-2022-HUMAN-02-02.
Connected via HORIZON-RAISE-2026-01-01, not directly to the current topic.
HORIZON-CL4-INDUSTRY-2025-01-DIGITAL-61 developes AI foundation models for science, including materials science, and is part of the RAISE initiative, just like HORIZON-RAISE-2026-01-01.
Connected via HORIZON-CL4-INDUSTRY-2025-01-DIGITAL-62, not directly to the current topic.
The CSA from 2025 funds the project SCIANCE, tasked to support the setup of RAISE. RAISE pilot projects should thus link with SCIANCE.
Connected via HORIZON-CL4-INDUSTRY-2025-01-DIGITAL-62, not directly to the current topic.
The CSA from 2025 funds the project SCIANCE, tasked to support the setup of RAISE. RAISE pilot projects should thus link with SCIANCE.
Connected via HORIZON-CL4-INDUSTRY-2025-01-DIGITAL-62, not directly to the current topic.
The CSA from 2025 funds the project SCIANCE, tasked to support the setup of RAISE. Projects under HORIZON-CL4-2027-04-DIGITAL-EMERGING-11 are required to establish strong links with RAISE.
Connected via HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-18, not directly to the current topic.
Cooperation requested by topic text.
Connected via HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-18, not directly to the current topic.
Cooperation requested by topic text.
Connected via HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-18, not directly to the current topic.
Cooperation requested in topic text.
Connected via HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-18, not directly to the current topic.
Cooperation requested in topic text.
Connected via HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-18, not directly to the current topic.
Projects under HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-18 should link with the AI on Demand Plattform built by AI4EU and AI4Europe.
Connected via HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-18, not directly to the current topic.
Projects in HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-18 are supposed to collaborate with the AI on Demand Platform.
Connected via HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-18, not directly to the current topic.
All topics under the GenAI4EU Initiative are supposed to link with the GenAI4EU central hub.
Connected via HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-18, not directly to the current topic.
All topics under the GenAI4EU Initiative are supposed to link with the GenAI4EU central hub.
Connected via HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-18, not directly to the current topic.
Synergies with projects funded under this topic are expected
Connected via HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-18, not directly to the current topic.
From the topic text of HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-DIGITAL-EMERGING-19: "[...] all proposals are expected to allocate tasks for cohesion activities with ADRA and the CSA HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-18: GenAI4EU central Hub."
Connected via HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-18, not directly to the current topic.
Proposals under HORIZON-CL4-2027-04-DIGITAL-EMERGING-04 are expected to allocate tasks for cohesion activities with ADRA and the CSA HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-18: GenAI4EU central Hub.
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Expected Outcome:
This pilot supports the Apply AI Strategy[1], particularly its research and innovation efforts, which aims to advance core AI capabilities, especially in frontier AI, and support fundamental AI research. The initiative will pool strategic resources to push the technological frontiers of AI and drive scientific breakthroughs, ensuring that the project contributes to the EU's goal of maintaining European leadership in AI research. Project results are expected to contribute to all of the following expected outcomes:
Scope:
Ensuring Europe's technological sovereignty in AI requires reinforcing and leveraging Europe's strengths, particularly its world-class AI research community.
The selected consortium should be composed by leading European AI research institutions. These AI research institutes should be entities with legal structure, dedicated facilities and, a significant number of research teams focusing on AI research. This category also includes multidisciplinary research institutions that host AI-focused branches meeting these criteria. The consortium will pilot a network of excellent European AI research institutes that will collaboratively address fundamental AI research topics, pushing the frontier of the domain. Participants will cooperate within a virtual institute, attracting talents, stimulating industrial initiatives, providing inputs for moonshot projects and developing research agendas for the ones retained by the EC. A substantial share of the project effort should be dedicated to advancing research.
To achieve these objectives, the consortium will undertake a range of dedicated activities:
This topic will bring together excellent AI research Institutes in Europe to further develop basic science in AI. Given the importance of such consortium, every participating institution will have to demonstrate its excellence in AI Research through a number of objective criteria.
To ensure openness, during the first year, the project will establish a call for expressions of interest to identify additional leading European AI research labs and individual experts that may collaborate with the project through joint activities or other forms of cooperation to support the expected outcomes and the dedicated activities described in this topic. Proposals should describe the type of actions planned for these collaborations. Appropriate budget and effort should be allocated to ensure that such collaborations complement the network’s expertise and strengthen the implementation of the roadmap.
This initiative will also work in close collaboration with other initiatives in the European AI landscape, such as existing Networks of Excellence, AI societies and associations, and with the fundamental research activities in AI taking place in the horizontal call HORIZON-RAISE and in the EIC pathfinder initiatives to be integrated in RAISE. All proposals are expected to allocate tasks for cohesion activities with the CSA HORIZON-CL4-2025-03-HUMAN-18: GenAI4EU central Hub.
The project selected in this topic should link to the resources offered by the AI Factories and the Data Labs and exploit the various tools offered by the AI-on-demand-platform to share the result and further develop the community.
Beneficiaries that intend to transfer ownership or grant an exclusive licence must formally notify the granting authority (i.e. DG-CNECT and HaDEA) before the intended transfer or licensing takes place and the granting authority may up to four years after the end of the action object to a transfer of ownership or the exclusive licensing of results.
Technology Readiness Level - Technology readiness level expected from completed projects
Activities are expected to start at TRL 2 and achieve TRL 4 by the end of the project – see General Annex B.
[1] COM(2025)723 Apply AI Strategy
EVALUATION RESULTS
Call HORIZON-CL4-2026-04
Published: 12.12.2025
Deadline: 15.04.2026
Available budget: EUR 221,800,000.00
The results of the evaluation for each topic are as follows:
HORIZON-CL4-2026-04
DATA-02
DATA-03
DATA-06
EMERGING-01
EMERGING-08
EMERGING-09
Number of proposals submitted (including proposals transferred from or to other calls)
31
6
63
4
8
41
Number of inadmissible proposals
0
0
2
1
0
0
Number of ineligible proposals
1
2
3
1
3
2
Number of above-threshold proposals
24
2
39
2
3
30
Total budget requested for above-threshold proposals
222,798,016.25 €
7,993,073.04 €
538,094,514.11 €
33,999,387.25 €
53,990,531.25 €
173,178,667.04 €
Number of proposals retained for funding
3
1
3
1
1
1
Number of proposals in the reserve list
1
1
1
1
1
1
Funding threshold [1]
14.00
14.00
14.50
12.50
14.50
14.50
Number of proposals with scores lower or equal to 15 and higher or equal to 14
3
1
8
0
1
2
Number of proposals with scores lower than 14 and higher or equal to 13
7
0
5
0
1
3
Number of proposals with scores lower than 13 and higher or equal to 10
14
1
26
2
1
25
HORIZON-CL4-2026-04
EMERGING -14
EMERGING-15
EMERGING-17
EMERGING-19
HUMAN-01
HUMAN-02
Number of proposals submitted (including proposals transferred from or to other calls)
1
2
1
18
105
32
Number of inadmissible proposals
0
1
0
0
1
0
Number of ineligible proposals
0
0
0
2
0
3
Number of above-threshold proposals
1
1
1
12
81
19
Total budget requested for above-threshold proposals
3,043,282.50 €
999,976.25 €
1,163,306.74 €
179,979,870.75 €
387,981,592.72 €
126,943,323.25 €
Number of proposals retained for funding
1
1
1
3
6
2
Number of proposals in the reserve list
0
0
0
3
2
1
Funding threshold [1]
11.50
13.50
12.50
13.50
14.50
13.50
Number of proposals with scores lower or equal to 15 and higher or equal to 14
0
0
0
2
12
1
Number of proposals with scores lower than 14 and higher or equal to 13
0
1
0
1
20
3
Number of proposals with scores lower than 13 and higher or equal to 10
1
0
1
9
49
15
[1] Proposals with the same score were ranked according to the priority order procedure set out in the call conditions (for HE, in the General Annexes to the Work Programme or specific arrangements in the specific call/topic conditions). For HE, to determine the ranking for ‘Innovation actions’, the score for ‘Impact’ is given a weight of 1.5.
Summary of observer report:
The two independent observers were tasked by the EC services to follow the evaluation processes of call HORIZON-CL4-2026-04 with respect to their conduct, transparency, and fairness, and to provide recommendations for process improvement. This Observers’ Report consolidates their observations and recommendations. Based on the observed Consensus Meetings and Panel Meetings, the evaluation procedures for all topics were carried with transparency, efficiency, fairness, consistency, impartiality with homogenous criteria in compliance with the applicable evaluation rules for each stage of the selection exercise (Individual Evaluation, Consensus Meetings, Quality Check, Cross-reading, Panel Meeting and Final Ranking for funding). The evaluation processes were carried out in full accordance with the Horizon Europe evaluation rules and the provided Digital Europe Programme evaluation briefings. The Call with 12 topics received 312 proposals, where 5 were inadmissible, 17 ineligible and 0 withdrawn. The number of proposals per topic varied from 1 to 105. Proposals were evaluated by 218 experts, with a satisfactory gender balance (44,5% female; 55,5% male). The majority of experts were from EU Member States and a small number from associated countries. Sixteen invited experts declined due to conflict of interest or other reasons. In conclusion, the overall assessment of all submitted proposals were executed in full transparency and compliance with the Horizon Europe applicable rules in a fair and impartial manner to select the best proposals for funding according to the topics’ specifications and expected results. The observers’ conclusion is that the scientific evaluations have been carried out in a just, transparent, and unbiased manner based on the Horizon Europe evaluation rules.
We recently informed the applicants about the evaluation results for their proposals.
For questions, please contact the Research Enquiry Service.
PROPOSAL NUMBERS
Call HORIZON-CL4-2026-04 has closed on 15.04.2026
312 proposals have been submitted.
The breakdown per topic is:
HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-DATA-02
31
HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-DATA-03
6
HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-DATA-06
63
HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-DIGITAL-EMERGING-14
1
HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-DIGITAL-EMERGING-15
2
HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-DIGITAL-EMERGING-17
1
HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-HUMAN-01
105
HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-HUMAN-02
32
HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-DIGITAL-EMERGING-01
4
HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-DIGITAL-EMERGING-08
8
HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-DIGITAL-EMERGING-09
41
HORIZON-CL4-2026-04-DIGITAL-EMERGING-19
18
Evaluation results are expected to be communicated in July 2026.
This call topic has been appended 3 times by the EC with news.
HORIZON-CL4-2026-04
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Find your collaboration partners for EU projects in the digital domain of Cluster 4 here!
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Outcome expected · 15 Sep 2026 (3 weeks ago)
Next: Grant agreement signed, 2 months from now (15 Dec 2026, estimated)
Work programme published
15 Nov 2025 · est.
Call published
16 Dec 2025
Call opens
15 Jan 2026
Call closes
15 Apr 2026
Outcome expected
15 Sep 2026 · est.
Grant agreement signed
15 Dec 2026 · est.
Work programme published Estimated
15 Nov 2025 · 10 months ago
Topics are listed in the Work Programme before the call opens. Spotting this early gives you a head start on partner search and proposal planning.
Call published
16 Dec 2025 · 9 months ago
This topic was first published in TopicTree.
Call opens
15 Jan 2026 · 8 months ago
Submissions can be made from this date.
Call closes
15 Apr 2026 · 5 months ago
Deadline to submit a proposal.
Outcome expected Estimated
15 Sep 2026 · 3 weeks ago
The maximum time to inform applicants of the evaluation outcome is five months after the call closes.
Grant agreement signed Estimated
15 Dec 2026 · 2 months from now
The maximum time to sign the grant agreement is three months after applicants are informed of the outcome.
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This call topic is part of the following thematic bubbles.
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This bubble includes call topics from Horizon Europe and Digital Europe contributing to the European Commission's Apply AI strategy.You can find more...