AI Boost – AI Challenge Competition
AI Boost – AI Challenge Competition
AI-BOOST, a new project funded by the European Commission’s Horizon Europe, is a prominent open challenge prize programme that will serve as a benchmark for the European artificial intelligence (AI) community. The overall objective of the project is to create and run highly replicable AI open innovation competitions that attract the outstanding talent all over EU and Associated Countries, to drive scientific progress in the major AI Areas. The project will foster collaboration between the key stakeholders in AI community to define attractive AI challenges with the potential to lead trustworthy and human-centric real-world solutions.
Entité de financement
Commission Européenne - Horizon EuropeClôture de l'appel
8 septembre 2026Zone géographique
eur
Objectif
The AI Challenge Competition (teams from academia and/or industry) will launch 4 attractive Generative AI challenges addressing strategic industrial and societal domains: autonomous robotics, engineering design and simulation, healthcare AI, and automotive safety.
The AI-BOOST competition follows a two-phase funnel approach designed to identify, support and accelerate the most promising teams from academia and industry. This approach enables the AI-BOOST consortium, evaluators and Challenge Owners to progressively focus resources and support on the strongest candidates, while ensuring continuous monitoring of scientific and technical progress throughout the competition.
Critères d'éligibilité
The participants (or contestants) can apply as individuals or linked to a legal entity. Hence, eligible applicants are:
• Individuals (students, researchers…);
• Single legal entity;
• Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), this includes startups;
• Academia, universities, NGOs, non-profit organizations or a consortium of these;
• Have technical capacity AND experience working on AI systems. Also consider that projects must focus exclusively on civil applications;
• Be established in one of the Member States (MS) of the European Union (EU), including overseas countries and territories (OCTs) and also Horizon Europe Associated Countries.
Technologies clés
AI Challenge Competition #1
1. GenAI-Based Natural Language Mission Generator for Autonomous Robots in Agriculture — Intellimech / JOiiNT LAB
2. Agentic AI for Automated CAD Generation and Autonomous Simulation — SIAD Group
Deadline: 25 August 2026, 17:00 CEST / Brussels time
AI Challenge Competition #2
3. Generative AI for Enhancement of Clinical Datasets — EUCAIM
4. Generative AI for Automatic Test Case Generation from Crash Databases & Standards — Siemens Industry Software NV
Typologie de consortium
The competition aims to drive significant research and technological progress by advancing innovative Generative AI solutions from Technology Readiness Level (TRL) 2–3 to TRL 4–5.
The competition consists of the following phases:
• Spark Phase I: Submission and evaluation of a Concept Note. Five winners will be selected for each challenge and awarded a prize of EUR 28,500 each.
• Advance phase: Development, model validation and demonstration of AI solutions. The five winners of the SPARK Phase will enter a five-month development programme involving algorithm development, validation activities, conceptual and technical monitoring, and a final live demonstration. One winner will be selected for each challenge and awarded a final prize of EUR 100,000.
The AI-BOOST competition is expected to generate 20 breakthrough AI solutions, contributing to substantial scientific and technological progress in the targeted AI domains. Among these, four solutions (one per challenge) will be recognised as the most promising for industrial adoption and real-world deployment.
Participants who are granted access to CINECA’s computing infrastructure will receive dedicated training and technical onboarding to support the effective use of the available HPC resources during the competition.