Promotion of bilateral research projects between Germany and Poland

23.03.2026

Are you an SME and would like to initiate a technological research and innovation project with Polish SMEs and research institutes? Then use the ZIM International funding instrument for bilateral projects with Poland.

The 3rd bilateral call for proposals by the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy (BMWE) together with the Polish National Centre for Research and Development (NCBR) is currently open for submissions until April 30.

The consortium must include at least one German SME. The aim of the projects is to develop market-effective technological innovations, such as new products, processes or technical services that correspond to the international state of the art. SMEs and/or research institutions from Poland can participate. The funding conditions are based on theZIM guidelinesfor German partners and theINNOGLOBOprogram for Polish partners.

For German partners, funding of EUR 560,000 is available per sub-project, with a maximum of EUR 3 million for the overall project. In Poland, the funding amounts to at least PLN 300,000 and a maximum of PLN 2 million per project. In the ZIM program, the funding rate for international projects is 60%, for participating research institutions 100%.

If you have a project idea and are still looking for suitable partners, you can search for cooperation partners in thepartnering database of the Enterprise Europe Networkusing appropriate thematic filters.

Further information

Do you have any questions about the EU initiative? Our partner organization Bayerische Forschungsallianz - KMU Beratungsstelle will be happy to answer your questions.