Objectives

The Work Programme 2026-27 in Cluster “Digital, Industry and Space” supports digital and industrial technologies to close the innovation gap through innovative technologies geared towards deployment, support decarbonisation and competitiveness through focused industrial technologies, and reduce excessive dependencies and increase security. Within Call – INDUSTRY (HORIZON-CL4-2026-01), proposals are invited under the Destination Leadership in materials and production for Europe. This Destination brings together the research and innovation for a globally competitive European industry through the twin green and digital transition, and the availability, development, use, reuse and disposal of chemicals, advanced materials and critical raw materials. It translates policy priorities into actions, integrates inputs from partnerships and achieves synergies through a more integrated approach, increasingly combining priorities of different partnerships to enable synergies.

The call promotes circular economy approaches as a key pillar in value-chain design, including upcycling of secondary raw materials and waste, de- and re-manufacturing, and the development of sustainable and resource-efficient industrial processes. It continues to promote the application of the Safe and Sustainable by Design approach incorporating early and parallel considerations of innovation design choices on impacts on health, environment, climate and other sustainability parameters, supporting quick market uptake. The call also includes support for technology infrastructures and valorisation of knowledge to support start-ups and scale-ups. For topics where required, proposals should demonstrate expected outcomes by including a business case and exploitation strategy for industrialisation, describing targeted markets, market size, user and customer needs, competitive advantage, and actions to reach higher Technology Readiness Levels and future deployment in the EU.

 

Actions

This call covers the following topics:

HORIZON-CL4-2026-01-MAT-PROD-23: Accelerating the discovery and development of chemicals and innovative advanced materials through digitalisation and artificial intelligence (IA) (Innovative Advanced Materials for the EU partnership)

HORIZON-CL4-2026-01-MAT-PROD-24: Cooperation on innovative advanced materials with Japan (CSA)

HORIZON-CL4-2026-01-MAT-PROD-01: Advanced manufacturing for key products (IA) (Made in Europe partnership)

HORIZON-CL4-2026-01-MAT-PROD-04: Optimise the usage of resources in a circular economy (RIA) (Processes4Planet and Clean Steel partnerships)

HORIZON-CL4-2026-01-MAT-PROD-05: Circular innovative advanced materials: facilitating the transition from design to markets (RIA) (Innovative Advanced Materials for the EU and Made in Europe partnerships)

HORIZON-CL4-2026-01-MAT-PROD-31: Efficient capture / purification / utilisation of CO2 for the production of competitive products (RIA) (Processes4Planet partnership)

HORIZON-CL4-2026-01-MAT-PROD-41: Enhancing industry-academia knowledge exchange in Social Sciences and Humanities (SSH) (CSA)

HORIZON-CL4-2026-01-MAT-PROD-44: Attracting management talent for capacity building for Technology Infrastructures staff members (CSA)

HORIZON-CL4-2026-01-MAT-PROD-45: Pilot access schemes to Technology Infrastructures for European startups, scaleups and innovative SMEs (CSA)

HORIZON-CL4-2026-01-MAT-PROD-46: Mapping and service finder for Technology Infrastructures (CSA)

HORIZON-CL4-2026-01-MAT-PROD-48: ‘Proof of market’ to improve valorisation and commercialisation of Horizon generated R&I results (IA)

HORIZON-CL4-2026-01-MAT-PROD-11: Innovative technologies and tools for exploration and data modelling of raw materials (RIA)

HORIZON-CL4-2026-01-MAT-PROD-12: Technologies for innovative extraction of critical raw materials (RIA)

HORIZON-CL4-2026-01-MAT-PROD-13: Monitoring of secondary raw materials (CSA)

HORIZON-CL4-2026-01-MAT-PROD-14: Improving availability of secondary raw materials through recycling (IA)