CORDIS Archive : Help - Frequently Asked Questions

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

4. STATE-AIDS

State-aids FP4

QUESTION
A company in Wales, is applying for a grant from the National public body and needs to ensure that they have not received grants above the de-minimis limit during the past 3 years. They received funding under the FUSE component of FP4, and need to know whether this needs to be included when calculating whether they have gone over the limit.

ANSWER
1. Support for FUSE (First Users' action) initiative under European Framework Programme 4 is Community support and therefore not state aid in the meaning of Article 87 EC Treaty.
2. Consequently the Commission regulation on de-minimis does not apply (directly) to Community support.
3. However your FUSE action might be covered by the de-minimis regulation if this or other Community support is granted in addition to national support.
4. As concerns notification: support for FUSE action as Community support is not subject to the state aid notification rules- consequently there is no ceiling applicable.

States-aids 5FP CRAFT

QUESTION
An enterprise which receives funding through a CRAFT project, does it count for the rule "de minimis" ?"

ANSWER
1. Support under CRAFT is Community support and therefore not state aid in the meaning of Article 87 EC Treaty.
2. Consequently the Commission regulation on de-minimis does not apply (directly) to CRAFT support.
3. However CRAFT might be caught by the de-minimis regulation if CRAFT support is granted in addition to national support.
4. As concerns notification: CRAFT support as Community support is not subject to the state aid notification rules - consequently there is no ceiling applicable.

State-aids framework

QUESTION
1. I need to know which is the current EU legislation referring public R&D; support to firms (limits and constraints).
2. In particular, I would like to know whether there is any inconvenience or legal constraint for a regional Government to put out to tender the execution of R&D; communication and diffusion projects (subsidised up to 90%) by (consultancy or similar) firms and private organisations.

ANSWER
1. The current EU legislation referring to public R& D support to firms, is the Communication of the European Commission relating to the "Community Framework for state aid for research and development" O. J. nº C 045 of the 17/02/1996 P 0005 -0014, that you will be able to consult in the following electronic address: http://europa.eu/comm/competition/state_aid/legislation/iia/en.pdf

2. This regulation is applicable exclusively to aids granted by national authorities, the Community support to actions for dissemination of R&D; results - managed by our Directorate-General - being outside the area of implementation of the above mentioned Community Framework.

Regarding the legality of the specific regional aid to which you refer, please note that there is no a priori legal constraint, as far as the conditions of the mentioned Framework are respected. However, for further information and in order to confirm its legality, please contact the Directorate-General Competition services, and in particular the direction responsible for the examination of the compatibility of the State aids with the regulations of the internal market and the regulations of the EC Treaty (http://europa.eu/comm/dgs/competition/directory/organi_en.pdf)