cross-border SMEsmeans SMEs which are established in Member States or associated countries other than those in which recipients that are not SMEs are established and which participate in the activity as recipients, subcontractors or other legal entities in the supply chain;’
defence readinessmeans the state of preparedness of a Member State or several Member States to respond to a crisis as defined in Article 1, point (10), of Directive 2009/81/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council, which relates to defence.
ex aequo proposalsmeans two or more proposals that have obtained the same evaluation score following a call for proposals;’
pre-commercial procurementmeans the procurement of research and development services involving risk-benefit sharing under market conditions where there is a clear separation of the research and development services procured from the deployment of commercial volumes of end-products;’