International Press Institute announces New Media Incubator Programme

IPI’s New Media Incubator is an eight-month programme supporting startups and new media ventures. Already in its second edition, the Incubator offers funding, personalized advisory services, training, tools and guidance. They help you identify market needs, discover new opportunities and build sustainable and creative news products shaping the media market today and tomorrow. Applying media should have existing market and audience research, a solid business case and the energy to grow.

The Incubator supports newsrooms that are up to three years old OR have a minimum viable product (MVP) you will launch in the next six months. An MVP is the basic yet functional version of your product enough to test your product and gain feedback with minimal resources.

Funding Information

• Applicants to the New Media Incubator can request grants up to €15,000.

Benefits

• One month of personalized needs assessments to identify your challenge, problem statement and roadmap solutions.
• Intensive training focused on tools and skills that can be transferred to your newsroom well beyond the duration of the Incubator, focused on problem-solving and identifying solutions, audience research, strategic planning and product management, journalism formats built for user engagement, digital business models and diversifying revenue models.
• 4-day, in-person bootcamp in Vienna with 2-3 members from each media in the Incubator, coupled with attendance at 2025 IPI’s World Congress and Media Innovation Festival in Vienna.
• One-on-one personalized advisory services bespoke to the needs of your newsroom, with flexible, on-demand industry experts as coaches during the incubator.
• Group coaching sessions with peers developing similar projects.
• Speaker sessions and workshops based on themes determined in the needs assessments.
• Access to an e-learning platform with training modules and recordings from industry leaders. Monthly “Ask-Me-Anything” sessions allow attendees to directly pose questions to industry experts.
• Access to a networking platform with the current cohort, expert coaches, all programme alumni and a network of media innovators.

Eligible Costs

• The New Media Incubator grant may be used to cover nearly any costs necessary for the production of their proposed project. This includes, but is not limited to, programmatic and operational costs (e.g., travel costs to the annual Media Innovation Festival), software, web development, human resources, research- and production-related costs, travel costs and translation costs.

Ineligible Costs

• Hardware costs (e.g., computers and video cameras) are not eligible.

Eligibility Criteria

• You are based in one of the following countries: Albania, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Republic of Cyprus, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Kosovo, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Moldova, Montenegro, Netherlands, North Macedonia, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, and Ukraine.
• You are a media organization with an idea that is ready to launch in the next six months or a startup that is up to three years old and building or expanding news products or revenue streams.
• Your organization must have a minimum viable product and a strategic approach to their business model. Applicable media may be building, but are not limited to, the following types of revenue and content products:
  • Reader revenue
  • Monetizing investigative reporting
  • Licensing strategies
  • Engagement strategies
  • Gaining young readers
  • Events and brand partnerships
  • Vertical, social video
  • Verticals or niche products
  • Ad-supported digital news
  • Digital audio
  • Newsletters
  • Print and/or digital subscription
  • Non-profit, donation, crowdfunding
  • Media technology
• You should have a clear and defined understanding of the challenge you seek to address and have identified a gap that needs serving.
• You should have a plan on how to identify and serve your audience, or be open to undertaking audience research and information needs assessments. Commitment to community journalism is a plus.
• Your media should demonstrate a willingness to explore and implement new ideas, tools and technologies to enhance storytelling and audience engagement, while learning from experts and each other.
• Your media organization is independent from political or business interests, is consumer-facing, and investing in an audience-centric concept or product for news gathering, creating or distributing journalistic work, and monetisation; or innovation in your media’s business model that will help make the company sustainable, competitive and of value to its community and European media landscape.
• You should have the capacity to carry out the innovations you will identify and the time to work through the Incubator programme to develop and implement lasting solutions.
• Your organization must have a team of at least two individuals who are willing to commit to Incubator activities throughout the eight months (this is estimated at a time commitment of four hours per week, divided between the team of two).
• You should have diversity in your Incubator team, demonstrating the right mix of skills to deliver your project, such as media management and editorial experience.

For more information, visit IPI.