The European Commission has decided to experiment under FP7 a new approach for an Exploratory Awards (EA) scheme for a limited period. As a first approach, the general aim of this EA scheme is to provide financial support to SMEs and SMEs Associations in order to submit better prepared proposals for actions under “Research for the benefit of SMEs”.The general idea of the present proposal is to identify all issues in order to implement new mechanisms of EA, targeting SMEs in FP7 Capacity Work Program. The new mechanism(s) to be developped will provide additionality to the National/Regional existing schemes, and target both countries with and without existing schemes. This “FP7 SMEs EA scheme” coordinated by OSEO innovation gathers 26 partners from 24 countries, working together during seven months on the project built on 4 steps approach, defined in the proposal 4 Work Packages. As a main deliverable, the “FP7 SMEs EA scheme” proposal will provide the European Commission with an implementation action plan, including one or several pilot funding schemes with an appropriate needed budget and a specification for the most appropriate management organisation at European level. The outputs provided by participants and associated experts, will result in an added –value roadmap for an optimised and cost-efficient implementation of the possible EA scheme.