Build a sustainable foundation for your media

• A grant of up to €15,000 to deliver your project.
• One month of personalized needs assessments to identify your challenge, problem statement and roadmap solutions.
• Intensive training focused on tools and skills that can be transferred to your newsroom well beyond the duration of the Incubator, focused on problem-solving and identifying solutions, audience research, strategic planning and product management, journalism formats built for user engagement, digital business models and diversifying revenue models.
• 4-day, in-person bootcamp in Vienna with 2-3 members from each media in the Incubator, coupled with attendance at 2025 IPI’s World Congress and Media Innovation Festival in Vienna.
• One-on-one personalized advisory services bespoke to the needs of your newsroom, with flexible, on-demand industry experts as coaches during the incubator.
• Group coaching sessions with peers developing similar projects.
• Speaker sessions and workshops based on themes determined in the needs assessments.
• Access to an e-learning platform with training modules and recordings from industry leaders. Monthly “Ask-Me-Anything” sessions allow attendees to directly pose questions to industry experts.
• Access to a networking platform with the current cohort, expert coaches, all programme alumni and a network of media innovators.

• You are based in one of the following countries: Albania, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Republic of Cyprus, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Kosovo, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Moldova, Montenegro, Netherlands, North Macedonia, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, and Ukraine.
• You are a media organization with an idea that is ready to launch in the next six months or a startup that is up to three years old and building or expanding news products or revenue streams.
• Your organization must have a minimum viable product and a strategic approach to their business model. Applicable media may be building, but are not limited to, the following types of revenue and content products: 
  • Reader revenue
  • Monetizing investigative reporting
  • Licensing strategies
  • Engagement strategies
  • Gaining young readers
  • Events and brand partnerships
  • Vertical, social video
  • Verticals or niche products
  • Ad-supported digital news
  • Digital audio
  • Newsletters
  • Print and/or digital subscription
  • Non-profit, donation, crowdfunding
  • Media technology
• You should have a clear and defined understanding of the challenge you seek to address and have identified a gap that needs serving.
• You should have a plan on how to identify and serve your audience, or be open to undertaking audience research and information needs assessments. Commitment to community journalism is a plus.
• Your media should demonstrate a willingness to explore and implement new ideas, tools and technologies to enhance storytelling and audience engagement, while learning from experts and each other.
• In your application, you will be asked to describe your vision of success with metrics to measure against, including a plan for sustainability once the project period is completed, and the resources needed to implement the project. (Note: it is anticipated that your project will change or evolve during the Incubator period).
• In your application, you will be asked to compile a budget for using the funds granted through the Incubator programme, describing the financial resources you will need for your project to succeed (e.g., technology costs, web development, human resources, costs required to reach audiences).
• Your media organization is independent from political or business interests, is consumer-facing, and investing in an audience-centric concept or product for news gathering, creating or distributing journalistic work, and monetisation; or innovation in your media’s business model that will help make the company sustainable, competitive and of value to its community and European media landscape.
• You should have the capacity to carry out the innovations you will identify and the time to work through the Incubator programme to develop and implement lasting solutions.
• Your organization must have a team of at least two individuals who are willing to commit to Incubator activities throughout the eight months (this is estimated at a time commitment of four hours per week, divided between the team of two).
• You should have diversity in your Incubator team, demonstrating the right mix of skills to deliver your project, such as media management and editorial experience.

An independent, international jury will select up to 15 projects to participate in the Incubator. The jury will be made up of individuals with a deep understanding of innovation in independent newsrooms, particularly in Europe, including product directors, media managers, media founders and managing editors from different countries across Europe. For this round of applications, Bellingcat’s Dessi Damianova will chair the jury.

Any attempt by any donor or partner organization to interfere in the decisions of the jury will be immediately reported to the rest of the jury. Jury members will be required to declare any possible conflicts of interest, and will be asked to recuse themselves from any judgment where such conflicts may interfere with independence or the public perception of independence. These recusals will be recorded.

After jury selection, the selected media teams will go through a process to check their proposed budget and project. IPI innovation staff together with the coach assigned to the team will streamline the project and ensure its feasibility, including ensuring the implementation of any recommendations from the independent jury.

Successful projects will be asked to sign a contract with IPI. 

Applicants to the New Media Incubator can request grants up to €15,000. Selected projects will sign a grant agreement with IPI to receive the funds. The disbursement of funds will be made in three installments:

• IPI will transfer to the recipient 60% of the New Media Incubator grant amount upon signing the grant agreement. 
• 25% of the grant amount will be transferred to the media upon presentation of the  midterm design review in the fourth month of the Incubator and verification of completion of all key activities set out in their governing framework. 
• The final 15% will be provided on the approval of a one-page narrative document measuring the success of their project over the eight-month Incubator, a review of how it contributed to the overall growth of their newsroom, and a review of how the grant was spent and what their newsroom’s future plans are.

The New Media Incubator grant may be used to cover nearly any costs necessary for the production of their proposed project. This includes, but is not limited to, programmatic and operational costs (e.g., travel costs to the annual Media Innovation Festival), software, web development, human resources, research- and production-related costs, travel costs and translation costs. Hardware costs (e.g., computers and video cameras) are not eligible.

Only applications in English received via the Jotform platform by the stated date and time will be considered. You will receive an email confirmation of your submission.

If you’re not sure about your eligibility, contact innovation@ipi.media or sign up for our upcoming info sessions on April 15 at 10:00 CEST, and May 6, at 14:00 CEST.

Past experience shows how important it is to build a diverse cohort and we encourage you to reach out if this sounds interesting to you!