How to Apply for the Enterprise Ireland Build Capability Grant
Understanding the Build Capability Grant Application Process
Applying for the Enterprise Ireland Build Capability Grant is a structured five-step process. It begins with a strategic discussion with your Enterprise Ireland Client Advisor and ends with signing your Letter of Offer before training begins.
If you are an Enterprise Ireland client and have heard about the grant, this post walks through what the application process entails. It covers what happens at each step, what EI assesses, and the one rule that catches companies out before they even start.
For what the grant is, who qualifies and the current funding rates, read the complete guide to the Build Capability grant for digital marketing first. This post assumes you already know the grant fits and want to know how to get it.
The One Rule You Need to Know Before You Apply
Any costs incurred before Enterprise Ireland receives your application are not eligible. That is a hard rule, not a guideline.
In practice, it means: do not sign a training provider agreement, do not pay a deposit, and do not start any training before your application has been submitted. Companies get caught here because the provider conversation often outpaces the EI conversation. A proposal is fine. A signed contract or an invoice is not.
Two other things should be in place before you pick up the phone.
First, an active Enterprise Ireland client relationship. Build Capability is for clients of EI and Údarás na Gaeltachta. If your company is not a client, your first conversation with EI is about client status, not this grant. There are staff thresholds too, generally ten or more full-time employees, with lower thresholds possible for HPSUs.
Second, clarity on the capability problem you want solved. Build Capability funds training that builds new capability inside the business. It does not fund a shopping list of marketing tasks, nor does it fund training you would have run anyway. If you can state the capability gap in one sentence, the rest of the process gets easier.
Step 1: Talk to your Client Advisor
The application starts with a strategic discussion with your Enterprise Ireland Client Advisor. This is not a formality. It is where fit, timing and scope get worked out before anything is written down.
The conversation covers which of the four productivity drivers your project falls under, whether the project aligns with your company’s stage, and how it connects to your growth plans. Digital marketing training sits under the Market Development driver, so for a project like that, expect the conversation to centre on your export ambitions and how the capability you build supports them.
Go into this conversation with the capability gap defined and a rough sense of the project. Your Advisor will tell you whether Build Capability is the right support or whether something else fits better. Take that steer seriously. An application your Advisor believes in moves faster than one they were talked into.
Step 2: The Training Specialist and the training workbook
After the Advisor conversation, you work with an Enterprise Ireland Training Specialist to complete the training workbook. The workbook is the core of the application.
It asks you to set out the training project in detail: the capability gaps being addressed, who in the company is being trained, who is delivering the training, what it costs, and what the business expects to be able to do afterwards that it cannot do today.
This is where applications are won or lost. A vague workbook reads as routine training, and routine training is not eligible. A strong workbook draws a straight line from a named capability gap to a structured training plan to a commercial outcome. If your project is digital marketing capability for export markets, that line should run from the skills your team lacks to the markets you have committed to entering.
Your training provider should be able to help you articulate this. If they cannot, that tells you something about the provider.
Step 3: Optional but useful: Spotlight on Skills
If you know something is missing in the team but cannot yet name it precisely, Enterprise Ireland’s Spotlight on Skills programme helps companies identify critical skills needs and build a skills plan.
It is not a required step in the Build Capability application. But if your workbook keeps coming out vague, it is a sign that the diagnostic work has not been done, and Spotlight on Skills is one structured way to do it. Ask your Advisor whether it makes sense for your situation before committing the time.
Step 4: Submit the application and the workbook together
The application is submitted through Enterprise Ireland’s online application system, with the completed training workbook sent by email. The two go in together. An application without the workbook, or a workbook without the application, does not move.
What EI weighs at assessment, in plain terms: whether the training is strategic rather than routine, whether it would genuinely not happen without the grant, whether the proposed trainers are suitable for the job, and whether the company is committed enough to see it through. That last point includes who inside your business owns the project. A training project with no internal owner reads as a purchase rather than a capability build.
Step 5: Letter of Offer, delivery, and the single-claim rule
If the application is approved, you receive a Letter of Offer. Sign it, return it, and read its conditions before anything starts. The Letter of Offer sets the terms of the grant, including the final claim date by which all expenditure must be incurred.
Two different lines matter here, and they are not the same rule. Costs incurred before your application is submitted are not eligible. That is the hard rule. Starting delivery after submission but before the Letter of Offer is issued carries a different risk: approval is not guaranteed, so any work done in that window is at your own cost if the answer is no. The sensible position is to treat the signed Letter of Offer as the start line. If a training provider suggests starting early to save time, that is a red flag about the provider, not a shortcut.
On claiming: the grant allows only one claim. You deliver the training, pay the invoices, and claim once against completed, invoiced work. The practical implication is cash flow. Your company carries the full cost until the claim is paid, so plan the project finances on that basis. The mechanics of the claim itself are Advisor territory, and they will walk you through it at the right point.
Realistic timeline from first conversation to project start
Nobody controls every step of this timeline, so treat any precise promise with suspicion, including from training providers. A realistic shape looks like this.
The Advisor conversation can usually happen within a week or two of asking for it. The Training Specialist session and the workbook typically take two to four weeks, mostly depending on how much diagnostic thinking you have already done. Submission is quick once the workbook is right.
The decision then takes a number of weeks, and your Advisor will give you the current expected timing when you submit. Add the Letter of Offer turnaround, and a company moving steadily should plan for roughly two to three months from the first conversation to project start.
That is not slow by grant standards. But it does mean that if you want a training project running in Q4, the Advisor conversation needs to happen now, not in September.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need to be an Enterprise Ireland client to apply?
Yes. Build Capability is for clients of Enterprise Ireland and Údarás na Gaeltachta. If your company is not currently a client, your first conversation with EI will focus on becoming one.
What happened to the Digital Marketing Capability grant?
It has been discontinued. Digital marketing training is now funded through the Build Capability grant, under the Market Development productivity driver. If you were planning a DMC application, the Build Capability process described here is the current route.
Can we start work with a training provider before approval?
No. Costs incurred before your application is submitted are not eligible. And starting delivery before the Letter of Offer is signed means you bear the full cost if approval is not granted. Scoping conversations and proposals are fine. Contracts, deposits and delivered work are not.
Is there an approved list of training providers?
No. Enterprise Ireland does not operate an approved panel or select providers for you. You choose your own provider, and the provider’s suitability is assessed as part of your application.
How many claims can we make?
A maximum of one claim per grant. You claim once, against completed and invoiced work, so plan your cash flow across the full project.
How much funding will we get?
It depends on your company’s size. Grant rates and caps are set by Enterprise Ireland and can change, so they are listed in the complete guide to the Build Capability grant for digital marketing, which is kept up to date. Your Advisor will confirm the current terms for your application.
Thinking about an application?
The strongest starting point for any Build Capability application is a properly scoped training project that your Advisor can assess on its merits. That is the work we do with Irish B2B companies, building digital marketing capability for export markets.
If you are considering an application, book a scoping call. We will tell you straight whether the fit is there, even if the answer is no.