AI researchers and innovators can receive lump-sum funding of up to €30,000 through the amai! Impact Booster for activities that engage citizens in AI research and innovation. The funding supports citizen participation and outreach, thereby fostering greater societal dialogue, engagement, and acceptance of technology. This support is complementary to existing Flemish research and innovation grants.
The amai! Impactbooster aims to strengthen citizen participation, technology acceptance, and societal impact within Flemish AI research and innovation programmes. Citizen participation means that citizens have a demonstrable influence on the underlying project or its follow-up activities. This may include helping to define or refine research questions; collecting, annotating, or analysing data; co-creating, testing, validating, or evaluating prototypes or algorithms; shaping design choices, boundary conditions, or use contexts; or contributing to communication and societal embedding.
Outreach activities are eligible when they are directly linked to citizen participation, interactive dialogue, or feedback on the role of citizens within the AI project. Such activities should foster dialogue, understanding, and societal embedding, have an interactive character, and go beyond purely communication or marketing activities that lack meaningful interaction with citizens or relevant stakeholders.
In 2026, the Impactbooster is targeted at projects funded through Flemish funding programmes such as SBO, PWO, TETRA, and COOCK+.
The call is continuously open. Applications are evaluated on a rolling basis in the order in which they are submitted. A maximum of five projects per year will be selected, based on the eligibility and selection criteria set out in these regulations.
Read more about the Impactbooster on the amai! website: amai.vlaanderen/impactbooster.