Suppliers are external providers to the activity, while subcontractors are part of the consortium.
Developments which are considered key for the activity shall be done by the prime or its subcontractors (they should not be done by suppliers / external providers). For example, if you are developing a satellite and a new instrument is needed, the development of the instrument shall be done by a consortium member and not by an external provider. Less important developments (e.g. the GUI of a software) may be outsourced to external providers. This rule does not prevent the prime or the subcontractor to procure COTS of any type that are needed for the success of the activity.
Moreover, any entity responsible for one or more work packages of the activity shall be treated as a subcontractor. In the ESA PSS forms (ESA Procedures, Specification and Standards Forms), all hours quoted shall be those worked by the Prime and its Subcontractors (partners in the activity). It is not allowed to quote hours of external providers of any kind, those costs shall be only listed in exhibit A to PSS-A2.
ESA pays directly to the prime (not to subcontractors).
All products/services of external providers whose cumulative value exceeds 5.000€ shall be provided with details of the procurement source (name of the company, country, number of person-hours quoted and rate/hour, and any major additional cost item quoted in the service). Furthermore, you should specify whether the product is a Commercial-Off-The-Shelf (COTS) item or not.
External providers with a total cost above 100,000€ shall provide their separate, signed PSS forms (A1, A2 and Exhibit A).
It is not allowed to quote hours of external providers of any kind, those costs shall be only listed in exhibit A to PSS-A2.
Costs of external procurement of non-COTS elements from countries outside of the bidding consortium members’ nations (i.e. in other ESA Member States and/or outside the ESA Member States) will be counted as eligible costs. However, the ESA share of these specific costs will always be 0% (shown in PSSA8 as Company Contribution of the right value under the relevant Work Packages) as InCubed is a guaranteed geo-returned program; this amount can be compensated in other Work Packages (e.g. paid at higher percentage). Anyhow, the total ESA overall price share can never exceed what specified in the Call For Proposal (e.g. 80% for SMEs, 75% for non SMEs). COTS elements will be treated as originating from the nationality of the consortium member.
Yes, this is allowable, with limitations provided in the allowable costs. In InCubed, up to 5 % of the total cost is allowed for marketing.
Object code is the compiled version of the source code. It is machine-readable and gives little user-readable information. Therefore it is a secure method to distribute software. Upon the completion of your InCubed activity, we require you to give ESA access to the final product, either as object code or in the form of a link (e.g. to a web platform).
Background Intellectual Property is a product’s IPR that is needed to produce the result of a contract (e.g. another product or a service), but which is not created under this contract (instead, it has been created prior to or during execution of the contract).
The access to a background IPR product not created under ESA contract shall be granted for ESA use
- free of charge (in fully funded contracts; for partially funded contracts the access is granted on favorable conditions to the contractor), and
- fully, but only for the use under the new ESA contract and not for any other purpose.
- If a 3rd party requires the use of the background IPR protected product, to modify/use it in another ESA contract, the license has to be granted but it can be at market rates.
Please refer to the General Clauses and Conditions for ESA Contracts (ESA/REG/002 rev. 3) for the complete definition of Background Intellectual Property rights.
Any major change with respect to the Proposal Part 1 [Outline] (like the addition of a subcontractor) should be at least notified and explained to ESA. You are required to be transparent towards ESA – we act as your partner in the activity and want to help you succeed.
Remember to actively communicate the status of your proposal to us. You shall request an extension of the deadline (just informing us is not enough), and you shouldn’t consider the extension granted until an InCubed team member has confirmed this on the ideas.esa.int. In addition, we need your commitment to a new submission date, not just a supposition. Please note that the new deadline may require the approval of your corresponding national delegation(s).
You may be granted one extension to a deadline of submitting an application stage. Please be aware that ESA may reject your proposal at any time in case you do not respect the deadlines or fail to communicate to requested inputs. In the case of a rejection, you may be granted an opportunity to resubmit your proposal from scratch.
The Prime must be an existing entity registered in esa-star, with the intent to commercialize the product developed under the InCubed contract. An academic player can be prime, but it would have to demonstrate commercial intent and comply to a maximum co-funding corresponding to that of a large entity.
In case a proposal includes the setup of a company/joint venture to commercialize the developed product during the contract, the prime shall be the main stakeholder and the contract may be transferred to the new entity via a Contract Change Notice.
In-kind contribution (IKC) (in ESA terms) refers to a type of allowable cost that can be accrued to the activity total cost. The ESA definition of in-kind contribution is the following:
- The expenditure has actually been incurred and separately recorded as being company funded product development.
- The IKC cost quoted for the proposed activity is at least 2/3 directly attributable to hardware elements. The remainder, at the maximum 1/3, is for software/assembly/ integration/test to make the hardware a functional unit.
- The IKC has not been paid with any public funds.
- Contributions such as but not limited to materials, information, equipment and services obtained by the Contractor free-of-charge do not qualify as eligible costs and therefore cannot be claimed as in-kind contributions.
- The item cost/depreciation related to the item (in case the item has been capitalised) has not been recovered through the rates (including overhead rates) or other cost elements.
- The item has not been subject to revaluation in the two calendar years before that of the start of the current activity.
- The maximum depreciation for IKC shall not exceed 20% of the overall cost of the activity.
- The IKC is of direct benefit to the proposed activity, as described above. Payments related to the IKC shall only take place upon use of the IKC and shall otherwise be forfeited.
Please also refer to the question “What is an allowable (eligible) cost for the activity?”
Please refer to the General Clauses and Conditions for ESA Contracts (ESA/REG/002 rev. 3) Annex 1, Section 4 for the allowable costs.