The FIRE-RES Open Innovation Challenge is a call for innovative solutions addressing a number of themes and challenges encountered across Europe and beyond in addressing wildfires, including Extreme Wildfire Events, and its impacts. For full information on the Open Innovation Competition, please visit our website. Please note that the applications are now closed.

For a list and explanation of the challenges addressed in this Open Innovation Challenge, please visit the challenges pages.

In principle, the Open Innovation Challenge is open to everyone (individuals, teams, companies) from around the world who has ideas for or is working on innovative solutions addressing wildfires. Find full information about eligibility criteria, and types of solutions and participants sought in our Submission Guidelines. Please note that the applications are now closed.

Please note that the applications are now closed.

You can submit your solution to more than one challenge. Please state the challenge and theme most relevant in questions 1 and 2 in the application form. In addition, you can specify up to two other challenges your solution addresses (from the list of challenges) in question 3 of the application form, see figure below. We will also consider the relevance of your solution to those challenges.

Note that the decisive factor for selection is that the proposed solution fits our themes and challenges, not that you have selected them in any particular order.

Question 3 in the application form 

You can submit multiple solutions under one or multiple themes. As F6S allows for only one application per profile, you would need to create a separate company/start-up/team profile for each application, see figure below. In case you do not have a registered company or start-up for the proposed solution, then you can fill in the profile for the solution’s hypothetical start-up/company. Please note that the applications are now closed.

Creating a new company/start-up/team profile in F6S.

Yes, you can. We welcome solutions from all over the world to apply and help solve the wildfire challenges experienced by the FIRE-RES Living Labs, see figure below. If we provide financial support (Pilot or Demonstration support), we will ask for your collaboration with one or more Living Labs to help solve their challenges. Please note that the applications are now closed.

Living Labs of the FIRE-RES project. Living Labs are geographical areas, such as sub-national regions and countries (mostly in Europe), in which FIRE-RES collaborates with wildfire stakeholders to demonstrate and deploy innovations to overcome wildfire problems

Yes, you can, if it is possible to do this in an easily accessible format, such as a link to a video demonstration or by uploading a file to the optional question 18 (Additional support material) in the application form, see figure below.

Question 18 in the application form.

We allow for teams (consortia of individuals) to apply. The partnerships have to be initiated by the applicants themselves; we are not offering brokerage events for this purpose. To apply as a consortium, you need to create a company/start-up/team profile, see the figure below.

Creating a new company/start-up/team profile in F6S.

We accept all kinds of solutions, including those that will be implemented as not-for-profit organisations or projects.

The intellectual property rights to the solution will stay exclusively with the applicants – individual(s) or companies according to their internal arrangements.

The selection of solutions is based on the quality of the application submitted. The criteria by which this is assessed are the clarity of the solution, its value proposition, its innovativeness, its fit to one or more of the challenges, the adequacy of its business model, the level of expected impact, and the feasibility of the proposed validation / demonstration. Find full information about the evaluation criteria in our Submission Guidelines.

The figure below provides information about the acceleration support typologies. All selected applicants receive mentoring and in-kind support to develop their solutions further. The majority of selected applicants will be invited to complete an activity plan for their proposed demonstration or piloting activities. A subset of these applicants will be selected for financial support for demonstration (up to € 5.000 per solution) or piloting (up to € 15.000 per solution) activities. The FIRE-RES Open Innovation Challenge webpage includes more information about “Why participate?”, such as the opportunity to make a difference, access to contacts, feasibility insights, networking and recognition. 

Typically, later-stage solutions will have a bigger chance of receiving Pilot support (up to €16.000 per solution). Demonstration support (up to €5.000 per solution) is available to a wider variety of solution development stages. Overall, the attribution of Pilot and Demonstration support will depend on the quantity and maturity of the received applications.

There is no fixed pre-defined timeframe or timeline that applicants are expected to conform to. The supporting activities are expected to take place in the next 12 to 18 months. For any financially supported demonstration or piloting activities, the respective activity plans and contracts will include mutually agreed tailored timelines.

Demonstration may cover component parts of the solution and / or involve testing in a lab or simulated environment, while piloting typically covers the full solution and ideally involves testing in a realistic environment. Here are some examples of relevant activities: (1) preparatory activities such as translation or development of technical documentation, adaptation of the existing solutions to a local context (e.g. software localisation), creation of a prototype, etc. (2) actual demonstration / piloting activities in the local contexts of the Living Labs (online or in presence) such as test flights with drones, running model and analysing data. Please note that this is not an exhaustive list – just some examples.

Please enter an appropriate company name during registration. It is sufficient if this is the name of one of the companies involved and will not disadvantage the other company/ies in your partnership in any way. You can then enter fuller information about the partnership of your two companies in field #4 (where you introduce the team members, specifying their respective company affiliation). If you then select ‘No’ under field #”5, you can explain in the follow-on open textbox where your companies are located and, briefly, what setup you propose.

Individuals from around the world can apply and are eligible for the different kinds of support we provide. The decision to offer a solution financial support will depend on the stage of development of the solution and, if it is pre-selected for financial support, on the quality of the activity plan submitted for either demonstration or piloting. Please note that the financial support is specifically tied to these demonstration or piloting activities.

Anyone can submit an application. It is acceptable for a solution provider to also be the beneficiary of a proposed solution. Note that we are not accepting new challenges (operational needs identified other than the ones that have been identified in the preparation of the OIC), so your proposed solution must match one of the challenges as outlined on our website. If we provide financial support (Pilot or Demonstration support), we will ask for your collaboration with one or more Living Labs.

You only need to create one profile – if you have an existing company, it makes sense to create a company profile. You will be able to enter full information about the team members in the application form (which comes after registration of the profile).

A cost calculation should be part of the activity plan you propose for demonstration or piloting. This should provide realistic costs to be incurred (for instance, licenses, equipment and material, travel costs, etc.). The maximum amount available for piloting support per solution is 16.000 Euros. For demonstration, the maximum amount available per solution is 5.000 Euros.

To clarify, the eligibility phase is actually very brief and only checks that the application has been submitted in English and the applicant has confirmed the Declarations section. Then follows the evaluation phase, in which the OIC evaluators decide which solutions are accepted for mentoring and in-kind acceleration support. A subset of these selected solutions will then also be invited to submit an activity plan for demonstration or piloting. Then, on the basis of the activity plan we will conduct an interview with solution providers together with representatives of our Living Labs, who will decide which solutions should be tested in their local context – i.e., which providers should receive financial support.

Your profile and the application form can be edited until you click the ‘submit’ button. If you want to change your profile or application after you have submitted the latter, you can submit a new one with the amended content for the same solution. Only the last version submitted will be taken into consideration in the evaluation and selection process.

Yes, we seek solutions for all phases of fire, including post-fire solutions. In fact, there is a specific challenge on the topic of recovery of ecosystems. This is challenge 4.3.