EU AI for Public Interest Prize

Artificial intelligence is transforming public services—but not always for the better. Algorithms decide who gets welfare benefits, who’s flagged for fraud investigation, and which neighborhoods get extra police surveillance. Often, these systems are opaque, biased, and unaccountable. Citizens don’t know how decisions are made. Public servants can’t explain them. And the people most affected—marginalized communities—have no voice in their design.

But AI doesn’t have to work this way. When designed with citizens, governed transparently, and built for public benefit rather than profit, AI can strengthen democracy, improve public services, and empower communities. The challenge is building these systems and proving they work.

The European Commission is offering €1 million in prize funding to recognize AI solutions advancing public interest and democratic participation. This isn’t research funding—it’s recognition and acceleration for AI applications already working in public services, civic engagement, or transparency initiatives across the EU. Winners get prize money, policy mentorship, visibility, and pathways to scale across European public institutions.

For teams and organizations in EU member states building trustworthy civic AI, this prize provides validation, funding, and connections to scale your impact. The goal is identifying and amplifying AI solutions that serve democracy, not undermine it—systems that are transparent, accountable, and genuinely beneficial to citizens.

What makes this prize distinctive is its emphasis on ethics, interoperability, and replicability. You’re not just building a clever algorithm—you’re creating governance templates, open standards, and evidence that can help public institutions across Europe deploy AI responsibly.

At a Glance

Prize Categories and Amounts

The €1 million is distributed across multiple categories:

Grand Prize (€400,000): The most impactful and scalable AI public interest solution. This goes to the application with demonstrated impact, clear path to deployment across multiple EU member states, and potential to transform how public services work. The Grand Prize winner gets funding for accelerated deployment plus intensive policy mentorship.

Category Laureates (€400,000 total): Awards for specific use cases—health, climate, justice, and democratic participation. Each category recognizes the best AI application in that domain. Category laureates get specialist support to integrate their tools into public service workflows, including procurement guidance and technical assistance.

Community Choice (€100,000): Pan-European public vote recognizing citizen-trusted innovation. After finalists are selected, European citizens vote on which solution they trust most. This award recognizes that public trust is essential for civic AI—technical excellence isn’t enough if citizens don’t trust the system.

Ethics Fellowship (€100,000): Residency for laureates to co-create governance templates with EU institutions. Winners spend time working with the EU AI Board, European Data Protection Supervisor, and other bodies to develop open governance resources, risk management templates, and evaluation frameworks that other public institutions can use.

Beyond the prize money, winners get storytelling residencies with public broadcasters to amplify civic impact, policy labs matching teams with cities piloting digital democracy initiatives, ethics clinics with EU AI Board experts, and open standards workshops on interoperability and accessibility.

Who Should Apply

This prize is for teams building AI for public benefit, not private profit. You’re a good fit if:

You’re Established in an EU Member State: Your team or organization must be legally established in one of the 27 EU member states. This includes startups, NGOs, research institutions, public agencies, or collaborations between these actors.

You Have a Working AI Application: This isn’t for concepts or prototypes. You need an AI system that’s deployed and working—serving real users, delivering measurable outcomes, and demonstrating impact. If you’re still in development, wait until you have real-world results.

Your Application Serves Public Interest: You’re addressing public services (health, education, justice, administration), civic engagement (participation, transparency, accountability), or democratic processes (elections, deliberation, governance). Commercial applications, even if beneficial, aren’t eligible unless they’re fundamentally serving public interest.

You Comply with EU AI Act and GDPR: Your system must meet EU requirements for AI governance and data protection. You need risk management frameworks, transparency documentation, data protection measures, and accountability mechanisms. If you’re not compliant, you won’t win.

You Have Multi-Stakeholder Governance: Civic AI shouldn’t be designed by technologists alone. You need evidence of multi-stakeholder governance including civil society and affected communities, participatory design processes involving citizens, advisory boards with diverse perspectives, and mechanisms for ongoing community input. AI designed without community voice won’t be recognized.

You’re Committed to Openness and Replicability: The Commission wants solutions that can spread. You need open licensing or interoperable APIs enabling reuse, transparent documentation of datasets and models, accessibility features (multilingual support, disability inclusion), and willingness to share governance templates and lessons. Proprietary, closed systems that can’t be replicated aren’t what this prize is for.

Insider Tips for a Winning Application

Demonstrate Citizen Co-Creation: The strongest applications show genuine citizen involvement in design and governance—participatory design workshops with affected communities, citizen advisory boards with decision-making authority, user testing with diverse populations, and feedback loops enabling ongoing citizen input. Generic claims about “user-centered design” aren’t enough—show specific, meaningful citizen participation.

Provide Rigorous Impact Evaluation: Don’t just claim your AI improves services—prove it. Show evaluation data comparing AI-enabled services against baselines, randomized controlled trials or quasi-experimental designs, independent audits of fairness and accuracy, and longitudinal data showing sustained impact. The Commission values evidence, not hype.

Show Pathways to Scale: How will your solution spread beyond your initial deployment? Demonstrate alignment with EU procurement frameworks, compatibility with European Data Spaces, partnerships with public sector networks, and technical interoperability enabling adoption. Solutions that can only work in one context are less valuable than those designed for replication.

Address Bias and Fairness Explicitly: All AI systems have bias risks. Strong applications acknowledge this and show how you mitigate it—bias audits disaggregated by protected characteristics, fairness metrics appropriate to your use case, processes for identifying and correcting bias, and transparency about limitations. Pretending your system is bias-free undermines credibility.

Articulate EU AI Act Compliance: The EU AI Act is law. Show specifically how you comply—risk classification of your system, risk management processes, transparency and documentation requirements, human oversight mechanisms, and conformity assessment procedures. Applications that ignore or downplay compliance won’t win.

Commit to Open Governance Models: The Commission wants to build public capacity for responsible AI. Show how you’ll contribute—open-source code or APIs, governance templates others can adapt, evaluation frameworks and metrics, and participation in standards development. Teams willing to share learnings strengthen the broader ecosystem.

Application Timeline

Nominations close mid-September with awards at the European Digital Assembly in December 2025. Here’s a realistic timeline:

March 2025: Attend information webinars and match-making sessions. The Commission hosts these to explain the prize, answer questions, and connect potential applicants with partners.

April-May 2025: Prepare your nomination including project summary, governance structure, impact evidence, and compliance documentation. This is substantial work—start early.

May 2025: Submit intent to nominate. This is a shorter document (5-10 pages) that gets initial feedback on fit.

June-July 2025: If invited, provide full technical documentation including model cards, dataset documentation, audit findings, risk assessments, and impact evaluations. This is detailed technical work.

August-October 2025: Participate in jury hearings and community showcases. You’ll present to expert juries and potentially to public audiences for the Community Choice award.

November 2025: Community voting period for Community Choice award.

December 2025: Attend awards ceremony and policy labs at European Digital Assembly in Brussels. Winners are announced and begin fellowship work with EU institutions.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can non-EU organizations apply? No, applicants must be established in EU member states. However, EU organizations can partner with non-EU entities—the lead applicant must be EU-based.

What counts as “public interest”? Applications serving public services, civic engagement, transparency, or democratic participation. The key is serving collective benefit, not private profit. If your primary purpose is commercial, even if beneficial, it’s not public interest.

Do we need to open-source our code? Not required, but strongly encouraged. You must provide interoperable APIs or open licensing enabling reuse. Fully proprietary, closed systems are less competitive.

Can public agencies apply? Yes, public agencies developing AI for their own services or for other public bodies are eligible. In fact, public sector innovation is highly valued.

What if we’re not fully EU AI Act compliant yet? Start working toward compliance now. The Act is being phased in, but you need to demonstrate serious compliance efforts—risk assessments, governance frameworks, and documentation. Ignoring compliance disqualifies you.

Can we apply for multiple categories? You submit one application, but the jury may consider you for multiple awards. You don’t need to specify which category—they’ll evaluate fit.

What happens after we win? You receive prize money, participate in the Ethics Fellowship working with EU institutions, get policy mentorship and scaling support, and gain visibility through European Commission channels. Winners often see significant increases in adoption and follow-on funding.

How to Apply

Ready to get recognition for your civic AI work? Here’s what to do:

Step 1: Confirm your eligibility. Are you EU-based? Do you have a working AI application? Does it serve public interest? Are you compliant with EU requirements? If yes, proceed.

Step 2: Attend information webinars to understand evaluation criteria and ask questions.

Step 3: Gather your evidence including impact evaluation data, compliance documentation (risk assessments, data protection measures), governance structures showing multi-stakeholder input, technical documentation (model cards, dataset descriptions), and letters of support from public sector partners and civil society.

Step 4: Prepare your intent to nominate covering problem you’re addressing, your AI solution, evidence of impact, governance approach, and compliance status.

Step 5: Submit intent to nominate by May deadline.

Step 6: If invited, develop full technical documentation and prepare for jury presentations.

Step 7: Participate in jury hearings, community showcases, and (if selected as finalist) public voting.

Step 8: If you win, attend European Digital Assembly and begin Ethics Fellowship.

Visit the official EU AI for Public Interest Prize page for detailed guidelines and application materials: https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/artificial-intelligence

Questions about eligibility, compliance, or evaluation criteria? Contact the European Commission DG CONNECT—contact information is available on their website.

Europe needs AI that serves democracy, not undermines it. If you’re building it, this prize can help you prove it works and scale your impact across the continent.