LIAA digitalisation support has ended ??

LIAA digitalisation support has ended, is it still worth digitalising without a grant ?

When the rounds of the LIAA digitalisation support programme end or the funding is already reserved, many companies automatically press “pause”: “If there is no grant, we’ll wait for the next call for applications...”

Meanwhile, processes keep slowing down everyday work, people sit in Excel files and emails, while competitors keep organising their systems and moving forward.

The question worth asking is this: does digitalisation make any sense at all if there is no “external money” ?

The short answer - yes, if you see digitalisation as an investment with a return, not as a “free project because there is a grant”.

In this article:

1. Why “external money” must not be the main reason for digitalisation;

2. How to calculate what “not digitalising” actually costs;

3. A short checklist with 3 questions – will digitalisation pay off even without support.

1. Why “external money” must not be the main reason for digitalisation

A grant is a pleasant bonus. It allows you to:

- start sooner;

- implement a broader project;

- reduce the initial financial burden.

But at the moment when the grant itself becomes the main reason for digitalisation, several risks appear.

1.1. The project adapts to the programme, not to the business

Then the logic often becomes this:

- not: “Where does it hurt the most in our business right now?”

- but: “What can we put into the project so that it matches the programme rules?”

The result – a system is created that looks perfect in the documents but, in day-to-day work, solves only part of the real problems. Or solves things that are not actually critical.

1.2. The right moment is missed

Processes are “on fire” today, but the company waits for the next call of the programme. In the meantime:

- people continue to process data manually;

- errors and delays continue to cost money;

- competitors implement their own systems and get used to working faster.

In practice, “let’s wait for the grant” means “let’s accept the losses for at least one more year”.

1.3. The grant is seen as a discount, not a bonus

A healthy mindset is this: “Digitalisation must pay off even if you don’t get a single cent from a grant. The grant only accelerates the return.”

If a project only pays off because some part of it is paid for by the programme, then an uncomfortable question has to be asked: does this project even make sense for the business at all?

1.4. The dangerous mindset “If there is no support - we do nothing”

If, in the company’s mind, digitalisation is tied only to LIAA or EU funding opportunities, it becomes a “sometime in the future” topic.

Meanwhile, digitalisation is actually a very concrete tool to:

- save time;

- reduce errors;

- free up capacity for growth.

In this story, the grant is only an accelerator, not the engine.

2. How to calculate the cost of “not digitalising”

To understand whether digitalisation makes sense even without a grant, you first need to know the “price of the status quo”. How much it currently costs us that our processes are not streamlined.

Practically, you can break this down into three blocks:

1. lost time;

2. cost of errors;

3. missed opportunities.

2.1. Lost time (salaries)

Start with one specific process, for example:

- processing orders from emails and Excel files;

- manual preparation of reports;

- re-typing data between systems;

- manual preparation of invoices.

Put a simple formula on this process:

- How many people are involved ?

- How many minutes per day does each person spend on this task ?

- What is this person’s hourly cost (not gross salary, but including taxes / total costs) ?

- How many working days per month ?

The formula for monthly costs:

How expensive = number of people × (minutes per day / 60) × hourly cost × working days per month

Example:

- 5 people;

- each spends ~45 minutes per day “cleaning up” Excel and fixing data;

- hourly cost ~15 €;

- 20 working days per month.

Calculation:

5 × 0.75 × 15 € × 20 = 1 125 € / month

Per year that is already 13 500 €, for just one process. If a system reduces this work, for example, by half, you can already see a concrete return here.

2.2. Cost of errors

The second block is the errors that arise from manual work. For example:

- incorrect quantity or price on an invoice;

- incorrect delivery address;

- a forgotten order because the email “disappeared”;

- mixed-up document versions.

Here, an approximate calculation is enough:

1. How often per month do errors with real financial impact occur ?

2. On average, how much does one such error cost (discounts, write-offs, extra transport, a lost client)?

Example:

- 1 serious error per month;

- one error costs about 300 €.

Per year that is already 3 600 € - and that is still without calculating the cost to reputation and nerves.

2.3. Missed opportunities (opportunity cost)

The third block is the hardest to measure, but often the largest. These are the situations where the company cannot:

- serve more clients because of a “lack of capacity”, even though in reality what is lacking is streamlined processes;

- prepare offers quickly and therefore loses deals;

- develop new products because the team is constantly putting out fires in day-to-day operations.

A helpful question is this:

“If our team were 10-20% more efficient, could we generate more turnover or increase profit ?”

If the answer is “yes”, then those 10-20% can often be achieved through digitalisation, automation and system integrations. Conservatively, you can assume that at least another 5 000-10 000 € disappears here every year.

2.4. The annual cost of “not digitalising”

Summarising the example:

- lost time: ~13 500 € per year;

- cost of errors: ~3 600 € per year;

- missed opportunities: +5 000-10 000 € per year.

Even with very cautious calculations, the price of the status quo is 20 000-25 000 € per year.

If a tailored system, integrations or a web application costs, for example, 20-40 thousand and significantly reduces these losses over a 2-3 year period, digitalisation pays off even completely without a grant.

3. Checklist: 3 questions to understand whether digitalisation will pay off even without support

If you want a quick “first filter” to understand whether digitalisation will pay off even without support, then ask yourself the following three questions:

3.1. Do at least 3 people do the same manual tasks every day ?

For example:

- re-type data between systems or Excel files;

- manually fix the same errors;

- search for information across emails, chats and folders;

- regularly update tables in various versions.

If at least 3 people spend 30-60 minutes a day on this kind of “clicking around”, digitalisation very often pays off within 1-3 years, even without any support.

3.2. Is critical information living in Excel with 1-2 people ?

A typical scenario:

- the main files are “with Andris and Ilze”;

- file names live their own life: final.xlsx, final_new.xlsx, final_v27.xlsx;

- no one really remembers which is the latest version and where something was changed.

This means:

- high risk of errors;

- slow onboarding for new people;

- business-critical information depends on the presence of specific people.

If you answer “yes”, then a unified system (a web application, CRM/ERP, warehouse or order system or another system)usually provides:

- a single source of truth for data;

- traceability of who changed what;

- faster training for new employees;

- a more secure foundation for growth.

3.3. Does one mistake cost you 500+ € and happen at least 1-2 times a year ?

For example:

- a mixed-up order (wrong quantity, wrong product);

- incorrect delivery and double transport;

- the client did not send confirmation and no one noticed;

- the wrong version of a contract is used.

If 1–2 such mistakes per year already “eat up” the amount that a good system improvement would cost, then digitalisation is not an expense but insurance against expensive critical moments.

Digitalise even without a grant ? A practical answer:

If you answered “yes” to even one of these questions, there is a high chance that:

- you are already losing every year an amount comparable to the cost of a reasonable digitalisation project;

- a grant is not a mandatory precondition for the project to be economically justified - it only accelerates the return;

- waiting for the ideal LIAA programme is often more expensive than starting with a smaller, focused step already now.

Digitalisation is not a one-off “project for the sake of a support programme”. It is a long-term topic of competitiveness, efficiency and profit.

What to do if you want to understand whether it will pay off specifically for your company ?

If you feel that:

- Excel and emails are dragging you down;

- processes have grown heavy and become unstable;

- the team spends too much time putting out fires instead of growing.

the next step is not yet another theoretical article about digitalisation, but a concrete calculation based on your own data !!

At Vizual our team helps companies every day to:

- identify the processes where time and money are leaking away;

- calculate the cost of “not digitalising”;

- create a tailored solution - from a simple web application or integration to a fully customised system for your business !

If you want to understand whether digitalisation will pay off even without a grant:

👉 Book a 30-minute consultation with Vizual.

During the call:

- we will go through 1-2 specific processes in your company;

- we will roughly calculate how much they cost today;

- we will give a clear idea of which digitalisation scenario would make sense and in what timeframe it could pay off.

You can implement the solution step by step even without any “external money”.

Let the grant remain as a bonus. The core decision has to be based on the numbers !