Czech Republic scores 20% Horizon Europe success rate - but only a third of excellent proposals get funding

A fifth of the proposals submitted by Czech researchers under Horizon Europe in the past year and a half are to receive funding, according to an early analysis of success rates.

This sets the Czech Republic, which currently holds the presidency of the Council of the European Union, more than four percentage points above the overall Horizon Europe success rate of 15.8%, as of August 2022.

Research institutions in the Czech Republic were involved in 1,165 project proposals, submitted through 87 calls.

Despite the high success rate, many projects did not get awards. Of those submitted, almost 63% were classified as good enough to receive funding, but only 20% did so.

This is a chronic problem running across all of the cash-strapped Horizon Europe programme. As a whole, 54.9% of proposals submitted under Horizon Europe to date have passed the quality threshold, but only 15.8% have been awarded grants.

The Czech Republic is one of the Horizon Europe Widening countries, a group of member states mostly in central and eastern Europe that historically have won a smaller percentage of grants from the EU’s research programmes. Boosting their participation rates in Horizon Europe is a key policy priority. 

It is also of concern to the Czech presidency of the EU Council, which has put enabling the use of other strands of EU and national funding to back R&D projects that failed to get Horizon Europe financing on its agenda.