Product · History
easy
An electronic system for preparing applications for grant-agency funding, which became the standard in Germany for submitting applications to project-management agencies.
About the product
easy (Elektronisches Antrags- bzw. Angebots-System) is an electronic system that supports the preparation of applications for funding from grant agencies in Germany.
At the end of 1997, the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) issued a call for the development of an electronic system that would support the preparation of funding applications. Among the applicants was a consortium formed by the Institute for Solid State and Materials Research (Institut für Festkörper- und Werkstoffforschung, IFW) of Dresden, the Department of Applied Informatics and Automation (KAIA MtF) and our company, MMS Softec s.r.o. The goal was to develop an “electronic typewriter” that would be available to all applicants for ministry funding.
The bid from the partners, who had previously developed the PROMAN W project-management system together, went far beyond this requirement. It proposed a system that acts as an assistant to the applicant when filling in the application, with automatic calculation, plausibility checks, on-line help and other features. On the strength of this comprehensive bid, the consortium won the development contract in direct competition with established German companies. The implementation was so successful that the assistant is used today by almost all German applicants for public funding.
Its main advantages include:
- the application is prepared faster
- the application becomes transparent
- errors are practically impossible in the application
- applications are complete
During development, care was taken to ensure that users could see the forms they had already filled in. Several versions of the easy system were created for the various application forms of different federal ministries (BMBF, BMWi, BMVEL).
Screenshots
Examples of forms in the easy system.
Once the user has entered the required items with the support of easy, the application can be printed. On printing, the application is encoded and supplemented with a barcode; the generated file is given the same name as the barcode, which guarantees that the file is identical to the printout. The user then submits the encoded file together with the signed printout to the ministry, where the file is read by the Profi application-processing system.
The easy system can be used as a stand-alone system and can be downloaded from the internet. For users of PROMAN W®, integrating easy into the project-management system creates a seamless chain of support — from the initial idea through application submission and detailed planning to the all-round administration and settlement of the project. Using an interface, data from existing project-management systems (SIGMA) can be read into easy, which makes editing applications easier and faster and reduces the risk of errors.
The easy applications were implemented in Borland Delphi and Kylix with a 32-bit architecture and run under Windows 95, 98, NT 4.0, 2000, XP, Vista and Linux. The original applications were intended only for the BMBF, but variants for further ministries and German project-management agencies were gradually added.
Download
For interested parties, the easy forms (AZK, AZA, AAK, AAA, AZV) are freely available on the German federal funding portal.
Go to foerderportal.bund.de →Dealing with grant applications?
We have many years of experience with systems for grant agencies. Take a look at the web-based e-VEGA system as well, or write to us.