May 20, 2026
Why companies still struggle to access public funding: Edgars Poga featured in Dienas Bizness
Proposal Peak co-founder Edgars Poga speaks to Dienas Bizness about grants, tenders and why accessing public funding remains difficult for SMEs.
Baltic companies have access to a wide range of grants, tenders and other public funding opportunities. Finding and successfully pursuing the right opportunity, however, can require significant time and internal resources.
Proposal Peak co-founder and board member Edgars Poga recently discussed this challenge in Dienas Bizness, one of Latvia’s leading business publications.
The interview covers the public funding landscape, the workload behind grant applications and the difficulties companies face when identifying opportunities that actually fit their business.
As Edgars explains: “A quality grant application often requires 200 to 400 person hours, which makes the process very expensive for SMEs.”
For smaller companies, this represents a significant commitment before there is any certainty that funding will be secured.
The challenge starts before the application
Relevant opportunities are spread across EU programmes, national institutions, the United Nations, the World Bank, public procurement databases and sector-specific programmes.
Before applying, a company needs to understand whether an opportunity fits its sector, geography, company size, technology and planned activities.
It also needs to assess:
- eligibility requirements;
- activities covered by the programme;
- consortium or partner requirements;
- co-financing requirements;
- available time and internal capacity.
For companies without a dedicated funding team, consistently monitoring these sources can be difficult.
Grant applications require significant resources
Once a suitable opportunity is identified, preparing the application becomes another substantial project.
Depending on the programme, companies may need to prepare detailed project descriptions, work packages, budgets, expected results, technical information and consortium responsibilities.
This is also why finding opportunities early matters. Discovering a relevant call shortly before the deadline leaves less time to assess requirements, involve the right people and prepare a competitive application.
A more structured approach is to continuously monitor relevant opportunities and build a pipeline of calls that could fit the company over the coming months.
Making public funding easier to navigate
Proposal Peak was created around this challenge.
The platform helps companies identify grants and tenders that may be relevant based on their company profile, sector and planned activities.
Instead of manually checking multiple funding databases, companies can bring relevant opportunities into one place and assess where there may be a realistic fit.
The goal is to make the early stages of the funding process more structured: finding opportunities, understanding their requirements and deciding which ones are worth pursuing.
Read the full Dienas Bizness interview
Thank you to Dienas Bizness for highlighting the challenges companies face when navigating grants, tenders and public funding and for giving us the opportunity to share Proposal Peak’s perspective. Read the full Dienas Bizness interview here.
Want to see which grants or tenders could be relevant to your organisation?