A SAFE, a Simple Agreement for Future Equity is a financial instrument which has been developed by Y Combinator, one visible accelerator in the US more than 10 years ago. Currently, in the US and in Canada more than 80 % of the investments in startups are realized as SAFE investments. In Europe, this financial instrument is not as widely diffused. The reasons for developing the SAFEs lie among others in a higher transaction speed and a lower level of bureaucracy in all periods of the investment lifecycle. Both mentioned reasons might also toughen up the European financial ecosystem. Since such an instrument can not be transferred in a “blind copy mode” into another cultural ecosystem with different policies and mentalities, the objective of DEEPSAFE is to design, validate , disseminate and finally establish an Europeanized instantiation of core SAFE building and deliver it into the European startup ecosystem (40 startups from emerging/moderate regions negotiating SAFE agreements with investors/corporates). As outcome, DEEPSAFE will be providing a validated DEEPSAFE legal framework tailored to EC law, a DEEPSAFE curriculum used for training all stakeholders, a DEEPSAFE White Paper, DEEPSAFE cross-border use cases and best practices for dissemination and awareness creation in order to increase the competitiveness of our startup Ecosystem in Europe.

BEYOND aims to achieve a more interconnected European business acceleration industry in between ‘modest’ or ‘moderate’ and ‘strong’ or ‘leading’ acceleration ecosystems in Europe, and therefore directly contribute to foster the rise of investment flows from net contributor regions (leaders) towards ‘modest’ and ‘moderate’ regions as net beneficiaries, which might provide one effective solution against the above referred undesired geographical gap. BEYOND project will focus on: 1.- Testing a Self-Sovereign Digital Identity scheme (funding passport) that start-ups get no matter what accelerator they join. Through the funding passport start-ups can document their journey and get access to additional funding; 2.- Building a joint platform for the core acceleration enabling online acceleration and a joint framework for how start-ups are most efficiently developed; 3.- Sharing specific offers from the different project participants and resources to increase the value for start-ups; 4.- Developing an incentive structure where all partners benefit from providing high quality start-ups and develop their services; 5.- Creating a cross-region marketplace for raising funding to start-ups so start-ups are not as dependent on the local investor landscape. These 5 elements constitute the backbone of BEYOND’s Virtual Accelerator Marketplace (VAM) a trust framework to support joint business acceleration activities that will contribute in a sustainable manner to enhance a balanced interconnectedness of private investment flows and thus, contribute to dramatically improve quality and outreach of business acceleration services in developing innovation ecosystems. The VAM will be tested through 2 editions of a joint acceleration program co-designed by 5 business accelerators backed on their own VC Funds, representing moderate (BG, LT, PL) and leading regions (DK, ES), that will select and support 2 cohorts of 20 Startups that will receive access to mentoring and VC investors.