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 Committee of the Regions (CoR) is calling on the Polish government to use its presidency of the Council of the EU to ensure that the next Framework Programme is not merged into a broader European Competitiveness Fund.
As discussions on the EU’s next long-term budget continue, Heike Raab, the chair of the Commission for Social Policy, Education, Employment, Research and Culture, advocated in a letter addressed to the Polish minister of Science and Higher Education Marcin Kulasek for a standalone FP10.
This includes “an ambitious, predictable, independent and strategic FP10 budget, caring also for local and regional interests in this field,” the letter reads.
Raab also pointed out the need to “rethink” the Widening programme, which the European Commission is currently reviewing, and increase public-private investments in efforts to strengthen the EU’s competitiveness.
Read the full letter here.
The Else Kröner-Fresenius Foundation (EKFS) has launched a new programme, providing €10 million in 2025 to support German faculties and universities in recruiting top US medical researchers affected by funding cuts being implementedby the Trump administration.
“This programme is our response to a worrying development. In times of increasing restrictions on academic freedom, we want to open up prospects for outstanding medical researchers in a stable academic environment,” said Dieter Schenk, chairman of the board of trustees of the EKFS.
German medical faculties and universities are now invited to apply, with the first application deadline set for June 15, 2025.
More details here.
In response to the launch of the Union of Skills, the European University Association (EUA) called on the European Commission for the establishment of a flagship EU initiative for lifelong learning.
“[The EU] should empower universities to develop long-term learning capacity and support interdisciplinary collaboration, so that Europe can step up to innovate and transform its economies,” it said in a statement.
The EUA also emphasised the need to make investment in higher education and research a priority of the Union of Skills and Competitiveness Compass through a dedicated European ‘Skills Fund,’ for example.
Read the full statement here.
A consortium of Estonian research institutions has launched a microchips centre in efforts to support the country’s tech companies and start-ups.
“If we want Estonia to develop competitive products and increase the share of high-tech industry, we need to build up companies’ competence in chip technology and provide them with the services they need,” Estonian minister of Economy and Industry Erkki Keldo said in a statement.
With a budget of €2.4 million over four years, the centre will mainly focus on hardware security, chip testing and safety and functional verification and aims to develop Estonia’s electronics and defense industry. Experts will provide consultancy and technical support and, in collaboration with universities, training courses.
Read the full statement here.
The European Commission has launched the Union Skills to address current talent shortages, especially in sectors under the Strategic Technologies for Europe Platform.
“The Union of skills is our strategy to help people stay ahead in a rapidly changing world and keep Europe competitive and fair,” Roxana Mînzatu, the executive vice-president for social rights and skills, quality jobs and preparedness, said in a statement.
Under this initiative, the EU also hopes to attract and retain international talents.
Read the full statement here.
France’s Aix-Marseille University has received 242 eligible applications from US-based researchers to participate in its ‘Safe Place for Science programme’ as Donald Trump continues to tighten restrictions on US science.
Most of the applicants are experienced researchers coming from various US universities and organisations, such as John Hopkins University, NASA, University of Pennsylvania, Columbia University, Yale University and Stanford University. Over half of the applicants are American (135 applicants) and fewer are French (17).
The disciplines most represented are social sciences and humanities (77 applications), life sciences (69), environmental sciences (40), and others like Earth sciences, mathematics, physics and computer sciences (56).
Aix-Marseille University head Éric Berton and former French president François Hollande have requested that a scientific refugee status be created to help US researchers continue their work in Europe. The idea could soon turn into law.
Up to 40 candidates will be interviewed in the second half of May. The first batch of researchers will arrive in early June.
Cyprus’ Research and Innovation Foundation has opened a new call to support projects that have been awarded the Seal of Excellence under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) postdoctoral fellowships calls.
The proposals have been evaluated by the European Commission with a score of at least 85% but failed to receive funding due to budget constraints, the statement reads.
This new call is carried out within the framework of the “RESTART 2016-2020” funding scheme, which is co-financed by Cyprus and the European Regional Development Fund.
The call budget is €1 million and the funding per project can reach up to €170.000.
Read the full statement here.
The community of Research Managers and Practitioners at research organisations in Finland recommended to simplify the EU’s Framework Programmes for research and innovation.
Citing “ambiguous call and topic texts,” the organisations say that the European Commission should simplify Horizon Europe work programmes.
“More developed calls have better potential for initiating great advancements beyond the state of the art and current knowledge base will improve the competitiveness of the EU,” they wrote in a statement.
Read the full statement here.
Spain’s transnational research centre IDIBAPS called for “preserving and enhancing” Pillar II in the next Framework Programme as it pointed to insufficient opportunities for low technology readiness levels research, the lack of bottom-up topics and inconsistent and overlapping call deadlines under Horizon Europe.
“Preserving and enhancing Pillar II is essential to ensure European efforts remain cohesive, efficient, and impactful for closing the gap between research and societal challenges such as health,” the organisation wrote in a position paper. “By refining call structures, providing less prescriptive topics, reinforcing support for early-stage collaborative research, and enhancing coordination across EU instruments.”
Read the full statement here.
Global quantum computing start-ups attracted £1.2 billion in funding last year, up 9% from 2023, and they are projected to receive an additional £40 billion over the next decade, according to a study by the UK-based investment and advisory firm Heligan Group.
“Every day we inch closer to realising commercial quantum usage for real applications,” Will Ashford-Brown, the head of strategic insights a Heligan, said in a statement. “It would seem we are at the point where commercial application, investment and opportunity are knocking at the door,” he added.
Ashford-Brown believes that projections for the market for quantum computing to grow from £412 million in 2020 to £8.6 billion in 2027 are an underestimation given the surge in demand that a new generation of computing platforms could soon trigger.
Europe’s top quantum start-ups are already seeing an increase in investments this year, including Quantinuum with £617 million, Alice & Bob with £150 million, Pascal with £140 million and Riverlane with £131 million. On a national level, China was leading the way in 2022 with an estimated funding of £13,3 billion, Europe at £7.2 billion, and the US at £2.1 billion.
Read the full statement here.
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