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Mobile · Case study

Allowance requirements: what qualifies, what does not.

An app startup submitted three projects; two were certified, one rejected. The dividing line shows exactly what the research allowance funds.

€725,000
research allowance granted
€3M
eligible base
25%
SME funding rate
Free assessment Read the story
At a glance

The mandate in figures

IndustryMobile / appSpatiotemporal social backend
Research allowance granted€725,000In-house work only
Eligible base€3M
Scenario2 of 3 certified, 1 rejected
Projects3 (2 certified, 1 rejected)
SME funding rate25%
About the company

The company, and the R&D underneath

The company develops an app whose content is tied to place and time and is deliberately ephemeral. The technically demanding part lies in the backend: a data model that manages place- and time-bound, short-lived states, and an asynchronous orchestration that reliably steers state transitions across distributed systems. Neither is a standard problem; both require their own technical solutions with an open outcome.

Alongside these was a third strand: an internal visualization of these state transitions for technical analysis.

The challenge

Where the funding really sat

That third strand is the crux. A visualization that merely displays existing data solves no scientific-technical uncertainty. It is useful, but it bears no genuine failure risk in the sense of the research allowance. An activity is eligible only if it aims at new knowledge or a new, substantially improved product or process and carries a technical risk.

The other two projects, the spatiotemporal data model and the asynchronous orchestration, carry that risk. The visualization project does not. The dividing line was therefore predetermined.

Novelty Technical risk / uncertainty Systematic approach
Our approach

How we built the case

We set up the three strands as independent projects and honestly checked, for each, whether it carries the three criteria. For the data model and the orchestration we clearly named the technical uncertainty and presented the solution path as a causal chain. For the visualization strand the situation was weaker from the start, a mere display of existing data without an open technical question.

This honest assessment is part of our work. We do not inflate an application with weak projects that could damage the overall picture. As a result, the two viable projects were certified; the visualization project was rejected, as anticipated.

How the case moved

↻
Three submitted
Honest, separate projects
↻
Selected
Risk as the yardstick
✓
2 of 3 certified
1 rejected, as expected

What made up the eligible base

In-house personnel work 100%
In-house personnel work

Eligible base just under €3 million, entirely in-house work; no contract research was needed. Figure shown is illustrative.

The result

A €725,000 research allowance.

The two certified projects carry an eligible base in the order of magnitude of just under EUR 3 million, entirely from in-house work. At the 25% rate applicable to the fiscal years in question, this yields a research allowance in the mid six-figure range. The rejection of the third project did not touch the core of the funding, on the contrary: the credibility of the strong projects stayed intact.

Eligible base €3M · SME rate 25%
2 of 3 certified, 1 rejectedThe outcome of the mandate.
Eligible base €3MRecognised cost the allowance is calculated on.
SME rate 25%Applied to the eligible base.
Key takeaways

What other companies can learn

The research allowance funds research and development, not every technical activity. Three points are decisive:

01

Risk is the yardstick

An activity is eligible only if it carries a scientific-technical uncertainty at which the project could fail. Mere display, routine, operations and standard work fall out.

02

Do not drag along weak projects

Putting an obviously non-eligible project into the application brings no benefit and can weaken the review's trust in the rest. Honest selection is stronger.

03

In-house work is the most important lever

Even without contract research the eligible base can be large, if the company's own development work is cleanly captured as eligible personnel work.

“
Some cases are instructive precisely because not everything went through.
BeFunded On the research allowance
FAQ

Your questions, answered

The most common questions on this kind of case. Short answer first, detail after.

Those aimed at new knowledge or a new, substantially improved product or process that carry a scientific-technical uncertainty. Routine, operations, mere display and standard work are not eligible.

Partly. Eligible are the parts with genuine technical risk, such as novel backend architectures or processes. Interface design, standard features and mere visualization are not.

The other projects are not affected. They are certified and funded independently. A partial rejection is no harm to the rest if the selection was clean.

No. The company's own development work, the in-house work, is usually the largest lever. Even without external engagements the eligible base can be considerable.

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