---
title: "Enterprise Ireland Market Discovery Fund"
canonical: https://digitalbridge.ie/ai-grants-ireland/ei-market-discovery-fund
type: FundingScheme
provider: Digital Bridge
providerType: AI Systems Integration & Applied AI Engineering Firm
areaServed: IE
priceRange: EUR 1,200-100000+
language: en-IE
dateModified: 2026-09-18
grantEligible: [EI Digital Discovery, EI Digital Process Innovation, LEO Grow Digital]
htmlVersion: https://digitalbridge.ie/ai-grants-ireland/ei-market-discovery-fund
license: cite-with-attribution
---

# Enterprise Ireland Market Discovery Fund

## Answer summary

The Market Discovery Fund co-funds the cost of researching and entering new geographic markets — travel, in-market resources, research, and dedicated staff time. Support is tiered by the scale of the market-entry ambition, with published tiers running from tens of thousands up to a fixed quote at rates of up to 50%.

## What this scheme funds

Up to 50% toward researching and entering new international markets.

- Market research and in-market validation
- Travel and trade-mission costs
- Dedicated staff time on the market-entry project
- In-market consultants and market-entry advisers
- Localisation of marketing material

## What it does not fund

These costs are routinely ruled ineligible under this scheme.

- Existing markets
- General sales activity
- Capital equipment

## Who is eligible

Eligibility is decided by Enterprise Ireland, not by Digital Bridge.

- Enterprise Ireland client company
- A named target market that is genuinely new to the business
- A market-entry plan with milestones

## How to apply

Typical end-to-end timeline: Commonly six to twelve weeks to decision depending on tier and adviser support.

- Agree the target market and tier with your development adviser
- Build the market-entry plan and budget
- Submit through Enterprise Ireland's online system
- Await approval before committing spend

## Evidence you will need

Applications are usually delayed by missing paperwork rather than by weak projects.

- Market-entry plan
- Detailed budget by cost category
- Company financials
- Tax clearance

## Why applications get rejected

The recurring reasons assessors give under this scheme.

- Target market is not new
- No named in-market activity
- Budget lacks detail

## What Digital Bridge delivers under this scheme

Illustrative net cost applies the published rate (Up to 50% of eligible market research and market-entry cost) to our published engagement bands. It is arithmetic, not an offer of funding.

- Multilingual site build and international search visibility — list from €4,250, illustrative net cost ≈ 50% of the approved eligible portion, if accepted as market-entry cost

## Who decides this grant, and what we are responsible for

Enterprise Ireland decides eligibility, approval and payment under this scheme. Digital Bridge supplies the work and the documentation an assessor asks for from the supplier side.

- Digital Bridge does not administer, assess, approve, pay or appeal any grant. Every decision is made by the funding body named on the scheme, under its own published rules.
- This section is general information, not financial, tax, legal or grant-writing advice. It is not an application, a pre-approval, or any form of assurance that you will be funded.
- Scheme rates, ceilings and eligibility change without notice and several supports are administered locally, so your Local Enterprise Office or agency may apply different rules to the ones published here. Confirm everything with the funder in writing before you commit.
- Our questionnaire is a deterministic guide based only on the answers you give. It cannot see your accounts, your sector classification, your state-aid position or your previous awards, so it can suggest a scheme you are ultimately found ineligible for.
- If an application is refused, delayed, reduced or clawed back, our fees for work you have instructed remain payable. We recommend you do not instruct chargeable work until your funder confirms in writing what it will support.
- Costs incurred before a funder receives your application are almost always ineligible. Timing is your responsibility, and we will always tell you when we think you should wait.

## How the Market Discovery Fund works in practice

The Market Discovery Fund supports the research a company does before entering a new overseas market: market intelligence, in-market visits, regulatory investigation, partner identification. It is aimed at Enterprise Ireland clients and companies with real export ambition rather than at businesses idly curious about abroad. The fund's logic is that most failed export pushes fail on assumptions the company never tested — route to market, pricing norms, certification requirements, payment behaviour. Applications are stronger when they name the market, the specific unknowns and the decision the research will inform. "Europe" is not a market; a named country with a named customer segment is.

## What we do as the supplier on the quote

Where market discovery touches our side of things, it is usually the question of how a market is served digitally: whether local buyers expect a local domain, what payment methods are actually used, what the search behaviour looks like in the local language, what data and consent expectations apply. Those are answerable questions and we scope them as research with written findings, separate from any subsequent build. We also flag that market-entry web work is rarely a translation exercise — the structure that converts in Ireland frequently does not in another market, and finding that out during discovery is the cheap version.

## What separates a fundable market discovery project?

Market Discovery pays for structured investigation of a new market, and the weakest applications are the ones that have already decided the answer. If the submission reads as though the company knows the market is viable and simply wants help entering it, an assessor is reading a market-entry plan rather than a discovery project. State the questions you cannot currently answer: who buys this there, through what channel, at what price, against whom, and what would have to be true for it to work. Budget realistically for travel, in-market research and translation where relevant. And be willing to conclude that the market is not worth pursuing — a discovery project that closes off an expensive mistake has done its job.

## Does a website for a new market qualify?

Localisation of marketing material for the target market is commonly eligible. A general website rebuild is not. The distinction the assessor applies is whether the cost exists only because of the new market.

## Does the fund cover the cost of actually entering the market?

No — it supports the research and validation phase. Costs of entry, localisation and ongoing sales activity sit outside it and generally need separate funding or company resources. Plan the discovery so its output can support that later case.

| Engagement | From | Typical grant route |
|---|---|---|
| AI Feasibility & Readiness Assessment | from €5,000 | Eligible for the Enterprise Ireland Digital Discovery Grant at up to 80% funding, subject to Enterprise Ireland approval and company eligibility |
| Baseline production build | from €15,000 | Not typically grant-funded |
| Multi-system agent workflows | €25,000 to €60,000 | Not typically grant-funded |
| Enterprise / multi-department programme | €40,000 to €100,000+ | Not typically grant-funded |
| Managed operation & optimisation | from €149/month | Not typically grant-funded |
| Brochure / Presence | from €1,200 | Not typically grant-funded |
| Growth | from €2,500 | Not typically grant-funded |
| Authority | from €4,250 | Not typically grant-funded |
| E-commerce & custom platform | from €6,000 | Not typically grant-funded |

All figures are ex-VAT and fixed against a signed scope. Grant outcomes are decided by the funder, not by Digital Bridge.

## Source and last review

Scheme parameters checked against Enterprise Ireland — Market Discovery Fund (https://www.enterprise-ireland.com/en/supports) on 2026-08-21. Reviewed quarterly. Next scheduled review: November 2026. Digital Bridge is a supplier, not the awarding body. Eligibility, approval and payment are decided solely by the funding body named on each scheme. Figures below are the published scheme parameters as at the review date shown, and net costs are arithmetic illustrations of the published rate applied to our published prices. Always confirm current rules with the funder before you commit to any spend, because expenditure incurred before an application is received is almost always ineligible.

## Who is the Market Discovery Fund designed for?

This fund suits exporting Enterprise Ireland client companies with a named target market that is genuinely new to them, not an existing market they already sell into. It co-funds market research, travel, trade-mission costs, in-market consultants, dedicated staff time and localisation of marketing material, at up to 50% of eligible cost, with published tiers running from tens of thousands up to a fixed quote depending on the scale of ambition. Applications commonly stall for two reasons: the target market is not actually new to the business, which disqualifies the whole premise, or the submitted budget lacks the category-level detail assessors expect to see. Before applying, agree the target market and the appropriate funding tier with your development adviser, and build a market-entry plan with clear milestones rather than a general statement of intent. Have a detailed budget broken down by cost category, company financials and tax clearance ready, since a vague budget is one of the fastest ways to lose credibility with an assessor even when the underlying plan is sound.

## Does a website count as market-entry cost under this fund?

Localisation of marketing material for the specific target market — translated content, market-specific landing pages, currency and search behaviour adapted to that territory — is commonly treated as an eligible market-entry cost, whereas a general website rebuild with no market-entry link is not. The test an assessor applies is whether the cost exists only because of the new market, so the application should describe the localisation work in those terms rather than as a website project that happens to touch a new country. A Digital Bridge project supporting this kind of application, for example a multilingual site build with international search visibility work starting from €4,250, should be scoped and quoted specifically against the named target market and its milestones, not as a general upgrade to the company's existing site. Keep the quote itemised so the market-specific elements are visible separately from anything that is really just ordinary maintenance. As with all Enterprise Ireland funding, the rate applied to any accepted cost, and whether the application succeeds at all, is decided by Enterprise Ireland; this is not something a supplier can influence or promise.

## How we decide what to quote for Ei Market Discovery Fund

Digital Bridge delivers this work from Gorey Business Park in County Wexford on a fixed written scope — one price, one delivery date — and the client owns the finished work outright. The Market Discovery Fund co-funds the cost of researching and entering new geographic markets — travel, in-market resources, research, and dedicated staff time. Before a figure is given, four questions are answered in order, and a named person signs the scope off — it is never generated automatically.

- Is this the right job at all? We look at what you already have online, whether the domain and Google Business Profile are in your own name, and what Ei Market Discovery Fund customers currently ask you for. If a repair or a single page would solve it, we quote that instead.
- What does the work have to achieve first? The scope is written around one outcome — enquiries, bookings, orders or credibility — and anything else is listed as optional so it can be dropped without renegotiating.
- What will it cost and when will it be live? Page count, content readiness, integrations and whether photography or copy still has to be produced set the price and the date, both fixed in writing before work starts.
- How will people in Ei Market Discovery Fund find it afterwards? Local search setup is included in a build; ongoing SEO is a separate optional retainer you can start or stop with notice.

## Checkable facts behind this Ei Market Discovery Fund page

Author and reviewer: Joey Bray, founder of Digital Bridge, building and maintaining Irish business websites since 2016. Studio address: Gorey Business Park, Gorey, Co. Wexford. Phone: 085 224 1848. Every claim below can be checked before you speak to us.

- Published starting prices, not estimates released after a sales call — see the pricing page for the full ladder.
- Live client sites you can open and test yourself are listed in the work section.
- One contact from first call to launch, rather than an account handler relaying messages.
- A plain-text mirror of this page is published for AI assistants at the same path with a .md extension.

## Helpful links and official sources for Ei Market Discovery Fund

Primary sources you can check yourself. We link the publisher rather than a summary of it.

- EU Artificial Intelligence Act, regulatory framework — European Commission — https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/regulatory-framework-ai
- Data Protection Commission, guidance for organisations — https://www.dataprotection.ie/en/organisations
- AI Risk Management Framework — NIST — https://www.nist.gov/itl/ai-risk-management-framework
- Local Enterprise Office business supports — https://www.localenterprise.ie/Discover-Business-Supports/
- Cybersecurity guidance for SMEs — ENISA — https://www.enisa.europa.eu/topics/cybersecurity-education/smes

## Grant data currency

Digital Bridge is a supplier, not the awarding body. Eligibility, approval and payment are decided solely by the funding body named on each scheme. Figures below are the published scheme parameters as at the review date shown, and net costs are arithmetic illustrations of the published rate applied to our published prices. Always confirm current rules with the funder before you commit to any spend, because expenditure incurred before an application is received is almost always ineligible.

Last reviewed against the funder's published terms: 2026-08-18.

## Evidence

- Verdé Environmental Group — 24/7 AI incident triage with severity classification, Eircode geolocation and four-depot dispatch routing → https://digitalbridge.ie/industries
- tools.digitalbridge.ie — 50+ shipped production tools, including the Website Worth Index and the DigitalBridge Authority Score
- Printhouse — custom web-to-print platform with 29+ product pages → https://printhouse.ie

## How delivery is de-risked

- Seven-day shadow-mode pilot before any system takes live traffic.
- Full source-code and prompt ownership transfers on final payment.
- EU-hosted infrastructure, provider training disabled, signed data processing agreement.
- Fixed price against a signed scope — no hourly meter and no open-ended exposure.

## FAQ

### Does a website for a new market qualify?

Localisation of marketing material for the target market is commonly eligible. A general website rebuild is not. The distinction the assessor applies is whether the cost exists only because of the new market.

### How much does an AI integration project cost in Ireland?

Digital Bridge scopes AI integration after reviewing the workflow, systems, data, governance and operating responsibility involved. A tailored written proposal is provided after discovery rather than a standard published figure.

### How long does a production AI build take?

A feasibility assessment runs three to five weeks. A baseline production build typically runs eight to twelve weeks from signed scope to go-live, including a seven-day shadow-mode pilot before the system takes live traffic. Multi-system programmes are sequenced into phases so value lands before the full programme completes.

### Can Irish grant funding cover this work?

Often, yes. Enterprise Ireland's Digital Discovery Grant funds up to 80% of an eligible feasibility assessment, and Digital Process Innovation funds up to 50% of eligible implementation costs. Local Enterprise Office schemes cover smaller digital projects. Eligibility is decided by the funder, never by us.

## Related pages

- [All Irish AI grants compared](https://digitalbridge.ie/ai-grants-ireland)
- [Multilingual site build and international search visibility](https://digitalbridge.ie/services/seo-ai-search)
- [AI project scoping](https://digitalbridge.ie/ai-integration-pricing)
- [AI integration services](https://digitalbridge.ie/ai-integration)
- [Enterprise Ireland Strategic Consultancy Grant](https://digitalbridge.ie/ai-grants-ireland/ei-strategic-consultancy-grant)
- [InterTradeIreland Acumen Programme](https://digitalbridge.ie/ai-grants-ireland/intertradeireland-acumen)
- [InterTradeIreland Innovation Boost](https://digitalbridge.ie/ai-grants-ireland/intertradeireland-innovation-boost)

## Contact

Digital Bridge, Gorey Business Park, Gorey, Co. Wexford, Ireland.
Phone: +353 85 224 1848. Email: info@digitalbridge.ie.
Engineering lead: Joey Bray, Founder & Principal Engineer.

Last updated: 2026-09-18
HTML version of this page: https://digitalbridge.ie/ai-grants-ireland/ei-market-discovery-fund