HORIZON BLOG: European R&D policy newsbytes (Archived_03)

The risks associated with international cooperation on research and innovation must be balanced with the problems that not collaborating can bring, according to The Guild, an association of research-intensive universities.

In a new statement, the association highlights issues that can arise with open collaboration, such as the potential for research to be weaponised or the problems of misuse of intellectual property. But if global challenges such as climate change and health problems are to be overcome, international efforts are needed, and global cooperation is essential to that. 

“If we were ever in doubt, the COVID-19 pandemic showed that international research cooperation is crucial,” said Ole Petter Ottersen, acting secretary-general of The Guild.

“Exchange of information between scientists from all over the world was a cornerstone in our response to the pandemic.”

Read The Guild’s full statement here.

The German Research Foundation (DFG) welcomes a recent constitutional court decision that emphasises the protection of confidential research data is key to academic freedom.  

The case involved psychology professor who interviewed prisoners for a project on Islamist radicalisation in the prison system. One of the interviewees was a suspected a member of a terrorist organisation. As part of the case, the prosecutor’s office confiscated the professor’s tape recordings and interview protocols. The professor viewed it as a breach of academic freedom and filed a complaint to the court.  

The court dismissed the complaint on 25 September but went on to express its concerns about the seizure of the professor’s research data. Despite the dismissal, the DFG says the decision is important as it provides guidance for similar cases in the future, ensuring that they take into account the principles of academic freedom and research integrity. 

The industry association Digital Europe wants the EU and NATO to spend 25% of their funds on digital policy, as part of a proposed 20-step manifesto to turn Europe into a digital powerhouse by the end of the decade.  

Today, the EU asks member states to spend at least 20% of their share of the €800 billion EU recovery fund on digital. But the target does not appear to be enough, as latest Commission report shows the EU is falling behind on key Digital Decade targets, such as boosting the use of big data and AI.  

Other recommendations include streamlining data rules, compulsory regulatory sandboxing with companies before legislation comes into force and a coordinated fund for investments in green tech.  

The call for new action comes as industry is concerned with a myriad of new EU regulations for the digital space and wants policymakers to shift focus to implementation, incentives for growth and collaboration. 

The European Space Agency (ESA) member states have agreed to launch a competition among innovative European companies, to develop a space cargo return service to deliver cargo to the International Space Station by 2028. The vehicle would also return cargo to Earth.

The announcement came after a meeting of ministers representing ESA member states at the agency’s space summit in Seville on Monday.

The service vehicle could evolve to a crew vehicle and eventually serve other destinations. Some €75 million in public funding for the initial stages of the project has already been secured, ESA said.

The security and defence research working group of the European Association of Research and Technology Organisations (EARTO) has published a series of recommendations in response to the draft Horizon Europe strategic plan 2025-2027.

EARTO welcomed “the more prominent role of citizens in research projects” and “the aim to include an increasing number of open topics” in the upcoming work programme.

Suggestions include to keep ‘civil security for society’ as the focus of Horizon Europe Cluster 3, and to allow lower technology readiness level research in this cluster.

The draft strategic plan, which will guide the final three years of Horizon Europe, is not yet publicly available.

Two non-profits in the European artificial intelligence and robotics communities are proposing to create a ‘CERN for AI’ to help Europe become a global leader in trustworthy AI.

The Confederation of Laboratories for Artificial Intelligence Research in Europe (CLAIRE) and the robotics association euRobotics have published a ‘moonshot plan’, which would entail around €100 billion of investment over six years.

They suggest this money would come from EU member states and associated countries, including the UK, and that other partners such as Canada, Japan and even the US should be included. The plan aims to develop alternative AI systems “aligned with European values”.

The Association of ERC Grantees (AERG) has joined the Initiative for Science in Europe (ISE), an independent platform of research organisations.

Founded in 2020, AERG is an international non-profit which connects European Research Council grantees, communicates the results of their work to the general public and to policy makers, and advocates for frontier science funding.

“We’re eager to join forces and work together with ISE and its members to strengthen our shared mission of defending fundamental research in Europe,” said AERG president Axel Cleeremans.

ISE president Martin Andler said AERG will “bring an essential dimension to our analysis and actions on the European Research Area, in particular on basic research as well as researchers’ careers and mobility”.

The Swedish economist Torsten Persson has been appointed to the governing body of the European Research Council (ERC), the 22-member scientific council.

Professor Persson’s research looks at how the evolution of values and political institutions shape public policies, and which people in society are selected to become politicians.

In addition, Gerd Gigerenzer, a German psychologist, will take over from next year as an ERC scientific council vice president for social sciences and humanities. He will replace Eveline Crone, a Dutch professor of cognitive neuroscience, whose four-year term is coming to an end.

The European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) and the European Investment Fund (EIF), which helps finance small and medium sized enterprises, have agreed to extend a memorandum of understanding for a further two years, working together on initiatives like market studies, events and training.

Since 2021 the two organisations have discussed various new financial schemes and investments for the EIT Community, a network of companies, research labs and universities. They have collaborated on a study of women-led deep tech start-ups, for example, and a scheme to make EIT digital education programmes more affordable.

“The past two years of collaboration have already provided us with several successful cooperation projects ranging from venture fund to education support all across our knowledge and innovation communities,” said EIT director Martin Kern in a statement.  

A delegation from the European Innovation Council (EIC) has visited the European Patent Office (EPO) to discuss closer collaboration. 

The group from the EIC, the principal innovation funding mechanism under Horizon Europe, discussed the possibility of sharing patent trends and other insights with the EPO to help to identify future high-potential projects. 

Read more here.