Horizon Europe is well underway, but the world of European R&D policy goes well beyond the confines of the €95.5 billion R&D programme. EU climate, digital, agriculture and regional policies all have significant research and innovation components. National governments often come up with new R&D policies, decide to fund new research avenues, and set up international cooperation deals. This blog aims to keep you informed on all of that and more.
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The European Commission is asking citizens for their opinions on shaping a new European Innovation Agenda aiming to tackle EU’s scale-up problem.
The Commission’s upcoming document is set to propose ways to help more European start-ups grow into scale-ups. It will aim to provide impetus to innovation-friendly regulation, attempts to connect innovation ecosystems around the bloc, initiatives reducing the gap between most and least innovative European regions, and measures for developing and attracting talent.
The online consultation is open until 10 May.
The European Space Agency is withdrawing from Luna-25, -26 and -27 missions as it piles on a new set of sanctions on Russia in reaction to the war in Ukraine.
The three missions led by the Russian space agency Roscosmos planned to use and test ESA equipment, but the space agency is already looking for alternative partners to test the technology. For one, the PROSPECT lunar drill and volatile analysis package, planned for Luna-27, will now go aboard a NASA-led mission. ESA is also looking to test its PILOT-D navigation camera, planned for Luna-25, with the help of a commercial service provider.
Last month, ESA halted cooperation with Roscosmos over the ExoMars mission, which was set to begin its search for signs of past life on Mars this year. The launch has been delayed but a study led by the company Thales Alenia Space is currently assessing how the mission can move forward.
The European Innovation Council (EIC) is looking to partner up with start-up accelerators, incubators, and research and technology institutions that can provide their services to EIC-funded start-ups and innovators.
In exchange, the partners will gain access to 6000 researchers and start-ups and 430 research teams, and have opportunities for deals with these up-and-coming entrepreneurs.
The EIC provides its own business support but is looking to expand its current offer with more specialised, sector-focused services, including access to laboratory equipment and research infrastructures, training opportunities, co-creation and business modelling solution, and start-up incubation and acceleration services.
Organisations can apply to partner up with the EIC until 31 May.
The European Federation of Academies of Sciences and Humanities (ALLEA) is advocating for the removal of barriers in the current patent system to ensure harmony with open science.
The academies find that there is “no fundamental opposition” between the principles of open science and current intellectual property rules but recognise operational barriers to open science remain in the way the patent system is structured.
To modernise the patent system, ALLEA proposes introducing a grace period of at least one year in patent applications to allow open publication prior to obtaining protection, among other measures.
“A reformed patent system is essential to the widespread adoption of open science, and could even incentivise it,” said Luke Drury, chair of the ALLEA Open Science Task Force.
The European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) has announced the winners of its funding scheme which provides grants and services to companies aligned with the EU’s green goals.
Each awarded start-up and scale-up will receive €50,000 in grants and business services, to deliver innovations such as sustainable urban farms that use 90% less water, using soil microbes to generate light and energy, and transforming building facades to grow and protect biodiversity in public spaces. All the innovations are seen as drivers for the New European Bauhaus, the European Commission’s initiative putting a label on the EU’s net-zero ambitions.
The EIT has a €5 million budget for New European Bauhaus in 2021 and 2022. In this latest call, it received 1,029 from start-ups in 37 countries.
The European Commission has published a list of key low-carbon technologies and detailed how research and innovation investments can be used to make them available for use energy-intensive industries, in latest attempt to provide a stimulus for decarbonisation in the EU.
The roadmap comes as Russia’s war in Ukraine prompts the Commission to further push for a green energy transition to stop reliance on energy imports from the aggressor. “Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has strengthened the case to accelerate the green transition and become more resource efficient,” said EU research and innovation commissioner Mariya Gabriel.
The Commission’s assessment maps the locations and greenhouse gas emissions of industries such as chemicals, iron, steel, and cement, and proposes actions for accelerating their decarbonization.
The Commission proposals include a potential creation of a platform for collaboration with energy-intensive industries, facilitation of national strategies and programmes, and establishing a community of practice to simplify the authorization for first-of-a-kind installations of low-carbon technologies. The actions seek to encourage public and private investments in member states. “EU instruments are available but cannot replace national and private investments,” said Gabriel.
The roadmap compliments the new Industrial Emissions Directive proposed by the Commission which introduces a revised framework for preventing and controlling industrial pollutants emissions from large industrial installations.
Six UK-based universities and research centres have been selected to deliver the UK’s software contribution to the Square Kilometre Array Observatory (SKAO).
The software system will play a critical role in the observatory, guiding telescopes where to look and when, diagnosing issues and translating telescope signal into useable data for researchers. The UK has already developed software for the telescopes during the design phase and is now set to lead as the telescopes are constructed.
After 30 years in the making, and with 14 countries involved, the construction of the world’s largest radio telescope began in South Africa and Australia last year. Once complete, likely by the end of the decade, the two-telescope system will enable scientists to study objects that give off radio waves far away in space, producing enormous amounts of data on the universe, and help explore the evolution of the early universe.
The government working group will draw up a plan for research, development and innovation funding beyond the current budget as the country eyes spending 4% of its GDP on R&D&I by 2030.
It will build on the work of a previous working group which committed to the target of increasing R&D expenditure to 4% of GDP by 2030, proposing to pass a government act to ensure this.
The working group, whose term ends on 31 March 2023, is made up by representatives of all of Finland’s elected parliamentary parties.
As the war in Ukraine continues, the Guild of European Research-Intensive Universities is urging the EU to provide flexible support for scholars at risk through dedicated funds and adapted existing systems.
“The need for support differs between universities, and evolves quickly within and across countries. We urgently need appropriate and flexible support tools at the European level to assist threatened scholars and students,” said Jan Palmowski, secretary general of the Guild.
This week, EU member states showed their support for more EU and national aid for students, researchers and academics at risk. The Guild welcomed the move but now asks the EU to go one step further and set up permanent support schemes for scholars at risk.
Since the start of the war in Ukraine, the European Commission has allowed more flexible use of Erasmus+ funds to help students and staff from Ukraine and set up a €25 million fellowship scheme to support researchers fleeing the country.
The European Innovation Council (EIC) is awarding €145 million to 39 cutting edge research projects on five strategic technologies.
The projects will be grouped under portfolios on self-aware AI, tools to measure and stimulating activity in brain tissue, cell and gene therapy, hydrogen production, and engineered living materials.
The portfolios will be managed by the new EIC programme managers to increase impact. They were also for the first time involved in selecting the projects. “With the new mechanisms under the EIC, we have the means to support the whole value chain and to transform these innovative technologies into successful companies in Europe,” said EU research commissioner Mariya Gabriel.
Each project will receive up to €4 million to develop their early-stage technologies up to proof of concept level. Programme managers may increase this funding for testing the potential of their innovations.
The next call EIC Pathfinder top-down call is set to open on 16 June, with challenges in cardiogenomics, DNA-based digital data storage, CO2 and nitrogen management and valorisation, quantum, energy storage, and healthcare.
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