I'm back to square one. Was thinking that EU money may not be that easy to access and it's exactly that. The funding is more of the VC / regular banks type than angel-incubation type. Like 99.9% the former
So if I do an angel-incubation type investment, once I agreed the idea has potential, I'm 100% aware and willing to risk losing my money. The upside needs to be very high of course, to make this sort of investments profitable. And they work like 9 investments out of 10 fail but the 10'th one makes a return 100x the investment. That's how I think business but it's obviously not what banks or the state (EU) do.
I could get a €10,000 "personal needs" loan incredibly easy from a bank at 8% interest, went one day with the ID card, signed the application including the permission for them to access my GDPR (check my record at the local equivalent of IRS) and next day I got the money. But there's practically no risk for them, I have to pay those money back with an interest (and my track record says not only that I can but that I could borrow even more only I don't want to).
The EU funds for startups are nothing like angel investments, they're shark loans just like banks do, only camouflaged in a lot of paperwork and bureaucracy. Luckily I also have a degree in accounting (although never really practiced and definitely didn't push for a CPA) but I know enough to read and plan balance sheets and reading theirs it became apparent they're offering me this "deal": we hand you €100 FREE MONEY! You can play the business lottery with them FOR FREE!! and if you win, you won't be bothered by us owning 40% of your business (the taxation level in Romania and probably EU average). But before we hand you the money you have to sign this paper which says if you don't win, you'll give us our money back. Guarranteeing with your income, property, whatever you got (like that €10,000 credit I got from a regular bank).
What pissed me off almost to the point of becoming enraged was the fuckers only clarified this essential information in the last two days of a three weeks course. "Enterpreneurial classes" they're called and that's another way to syphonate some EU money: 30% of the funds EU allocates for these sort of projects go just to "enterpreneurial classes". So out of an initial €100 allocated by the EU, I wouldn't have accessed but €70 anyways. Out of which 40% goes back to the Romanian state (not sure how much to EU) in taxes. Which means I get to use only about €40 out the original €100. And I have to pay those €70 anyways (the nerve!, not the net amount but the brute one) if I fail to build a viable business with those measly peanuts. They're effectively offering about €20,000 net, which I already have or can get from a regular bank, no questions asked as long as I repay my debt (you'll have to get a signed With the Romanian state (and very probably EU fuckers, likely it's not their idea since they never have ideas, are just bureaucrats), I'm also getting the imbeciles on my ass, aggressively trying to control what's none of their business: my accounting book records. Told ya, I know not only the technical side of the business I'm trying to make (12 years of experience in finance, 20 years overall, on top of graduating at the top of what's Romania's MIT university), but also basic accounting. And my initial encounter with the representatives of the state told me they don't know the latter and don't care about the former. Yet if I take this skark loan, they'll be deciding the stakes in my business so hell no, I ain't doing business with them.