A Great Blog

Orientation paper for "The ocean of tomorrow 2013" call

2012-05-09T06:11:00.001+02:00

The EC has published an orientation paper for "The Ocean of Tomorrow 2013" call on the Participant's portal.

Security orientation paper published

2012-05-02T06:26:00.001+02:00

The Orientation Paper 2013 for the FP7 Cooperation Theme Security has been published on the EC's Participants portal.

KBBE orientation paper published

2012-04-27T06:07:00.000+02:00

The Orientation Paper 2013 for FP7 Cooperation Theme 2 (Food, Agriculture and Fisheries and Biotechnologies), has been published on the EC's Research Participants Portal.

NMP orientation paper published

2012-04-24T05:57:00.003+02:00

The European Commission published yesterday the "NMP orientation paper", a draft of the NMP work programme including the description of all topics to be called in July 2012.

You can download the paper here.

FP7 Health - 2013 orientation paper published

2012-04-11T10:11:00.002+02:00

In preparation of the HEALTH call 2013, the EC has published an orientation paper on cordis. You can download it here.

New guide to FP7 financial issues available

2012-02-17T09:51:00.002+01:00

On 16 Jan 2012, the EC has released a new version of the "Guide to Financial Issues relating to FP7 Indirect Actions". The main modifications concern

- Conditions for the submission of Certificates on Financial Statements (CFS, "audits"),
- Interest on pre-financing,
- Further details on cost eligibility of bank charges, flat rate for daily subsistence and accommodation, parental leave, travel costs, bonus payments, recruitment costs etc,
- Clarifications on the activities which may be charged under the category "other costs", including "Management costs".

Horizon 2020

2011-11-30T16:07:00.005+01:00

The European Commission (EC) has today presented the corner stones of its new framework programme Horizon 2020.

For the first time, Horizon 2020 brings together all EU research and innovation funding under a single programme. With Horizon 2020 the EC intents to turn scientific breakthroughs into innovative products and services that provide business opportunities and change people’s lives for the better. At the same time the programme is supposed to drastically cut red tape, with simplification of rules and procedures to attract more top researchers and a broader range of innovative businesses.

Horizon 2020 will focus funds on three key objectives. It aims to

- support the EU’s position as a world leader in science with a dedicated budget of €24.6 billion, including an increase in funding of 77% for the very successful European Research Council (ERC).
- help secure industrial leadership in innovation with a budget of €17.9 billion. This includes a major investment of €13.7 billion in key technologies, as well as greater access to capital and support for SMEs.
- with a budget of €31.7 billion address major concerns shared by all Europeans , across six key themes: Health, demographic change and well-being; Food security, sustainable agriculture, marine and maritime research and the bio-economy; Secure, clean and efficient energy; Smart, green and integrated transport; Climate action, resource efficiency and raw materials; and Inclusive, innovative and secure societies.

Funding provided by Horizon 2020 shall be easier to access thanks to a simpler programme architecture, a single set of rules and less red tape. Horizon 2020 promises a drastically simplified reimbursement by introducing a single flat rate for indirect costs (20%) and only two funding rates - for research (100%) and for close to market activities (70%) respectively; a single point of access for participants; less paperwork in preparing proposals; and no unnecessary controls and audits. One key goal is to reduce the time until funding is received following a grant application by 100 days on average, meaning projects can start more quickly.

For more information please refer to the original EC press release and the official documents.

FP7 Calls for 2012 are published!

2011-07-25T21:45:00.004+02:00

Finally they are there! The FP7 calls for 2012 have been published on 20 July 11. After some technical problems they are now all available - for the first time ever on the Research participant portal.

The Participant Portal has become the European Commission's single authoritative website for the publication of FP7 calls. The FP7 call-related information is no longer published on CORDIS. Users of the 'Find a call' section on CORDIS are redirected to the relevant pages of the 'FP7 Calls' section of the Participant Portal. Also the Electronic submission system (EPSS) is now hosted on this single entry portal.

The calls are worth € 7 billion - the biggest ever calls for proposals, up by 9 % from last year. Their focus lies on innovation and the promotion of SMEs. Projects are expected to tackle today's challenges, in particular climate change, energy and food security, the need for greater resource efficiency, health and our ageing population. To add two years of healthy life for the average European by 2020 is a major goal.

Struggling in the jungle of 11 thematic priorities and their work programmes, buzz words, and secret codes? Contact us, we will guide you through and support you in the preparation of your proposal - sichern Sie sich Ihren Teil am Kuchen, gagnez avec nous!

DESCA version 3 available

2011-05-03T14:14:00.002+02:00

A revised version of the DESCA models for consortium agreements is now available on the DESCA website. You can find there

-DESCA 3.0 with elucidations
-DESCA 3.0 working document without elucidations
-Overview of modifications to DESCA 2.0
-DESCA report on the stakeholder consultation

and much more information and supporting documents.

We would like to cordially thank the DESCA team for all its efforts!

NET4SOCIETY published "SSH experiences with FP7 - a Commentary"

2011-04-10T18:41:00.003+02:00

How to improve conditions for SSH researchers in FP7 and beyond?

Last year NET4SOCIETY, a network of the 44 National Contact Points (NCPs) for Socio-economic Sciences and Humanities (SSH), carried out a survey about the experiences of researchers from the scoio-economic sciences and humanities with FP7.

The full results of the survey have recently been published and presented to the European Commission.

A summary of results and the report are available for download here.

New Head of office at Swisscore

2011-02-05T11:25:00.010+01:00

In its latest newsletter of Jan 2011, Swisscore informs that on 1 March 2011, Maryline Maillard, Head of Office since February 2007, will leave SwissCore. She will work for the University of Fribourg where she will be responsible for third-party fundraising, in close contact with both Euresearch and the Swiss national science foundation SNSF.

Her successor David Bohmert started on 1 February 2011. Born and raised in Switzerland, he studied public administration in the Netherlands and has worked there in several positions in tech transfer, fundraising and research policies. Prior to starting at Swisscore, he has worked in Brussels already, contributing to setting-up the Netherlands house for Education and Research (Neth-ER).

Download the newsletter.

Update of FP7 grant agreement

2011-01-25T15:05:00.004+01:00

The Finance Hekpdesk informs that on 24 Jan 2011, the European Commission adopted new measures that affect current and future FP7 Grant Agreements.

The Commission adopted three measures with immediate effect on the management of EU research grants in the current EU research programme (FP7):
· Allowing more flexibility in how personnel costs are calculated so that EU research grant-holders can apply their usual accounting methods when requesting reimbursement for average personnel costs. They will no longer need to set up entire parallel accounting systems just for this purpose;
· SME owners whose salaries are not formally registered in their accounts can now be reimbursed, through flat-rate payments, for their contribution to work on research projects.
· A new steering group of senior officials from all the Commission departments and agencies involved will remove inconsistencies in the application of the rules on research funding.

In line with these changes, Annex II of the FP7 Grant Agreement has been updated. The new version is available here.

The Finance Helpdesk also published an interesting list of FAQs around this topic, enjoy reading their related newsletter.

SME participation in EU-funded research

2010-12-14T14:23:00.005+01:00

On 16 Nov 2010, DG RTD published the 6th progress report on SME participation in FP7. The full report is available here.

According to this report there is hope that the 15% target of SME participation will be met before the end of FP7 in 2013: The EU contribution to SMEs in the Cooperation scheme sees a positive trend (15.4 % in 2010 as compared to 14.7% for the whole duration of FP7 so far). SMEs represent 35,4% of the participating entities in FP7 so far, which is the "highest single group participating in FP7".

The report of the recent FP7 interim evaluation (see for example the related SCIPROM news below), however, states that SMEs have a "success rate of only 17% compared to 20% for all applicants". "Most important, the participation rate of SMEs does not reflect the actual exploitation of results nor the global competitiveness of SMEs". And: “More attention should be paid to the quality and constructive engagement of SME participation rather than just widening it. In this way, the key role of SMEs as the bridge from pre-competitive research to innovation could be enhanced.”

Interim evaluation of FP7 - report of the expert group available

2010-12-14T13:41:00.002+01:00

On 12 Nov 2010, an independent expert group has published a report summarizing the results of their interim evaluation of FP7.

The group lists the following "key strengths" of FP7:

- FP7 is considered broad, well equilibrated in terms of geographical spread and and topics covered.
- The principle of excellence in project selection is largely achieved
- Mobility and training are making a valuable contribution to capacity building
- FP7 has a positive influence on research infrastructures
- Calls have been processed effectively and funds have been allocated in a reasonably timely manner

As "Areas in need of improvement" the group has identified the following:

- Administrative burdens
- The goal of boosting female participation to 40% has not been reached, currently only 30% of the researchers involved are female.
- Industrial participation in particular of SMEs is still hampered by complex procedures

Issues considered "New concerns and dilemmas" include the following:

- Research at national and EU levels needs to be better coordinated
- Success rates are low in many areas and imply a considerable waste of research resources; success rates are generally lower in the member states which only recently joined the EU
- Joint Technology Initiatives (JTIs) are perceived inconsistent in legal structures and procedures and the overhead rates are considered too low to cover the costs of participants

The full report is available here.

International collaboration in EU-funded research - HEALTH projects

2010-12-14T11:36:00.002+01:00

The number of EU-funded research projects with international participation is growing steadily. To face borderless challenges, international approaches are required and more and more collaborative projects are open to partners from outside Europe.

The EC recently published a brochure entitled "International collaboration in EU-funded research" presenting a number of HEALTH projects with international participation - providing both an interesting insight into existing initiatives and an inspiration for future project ideas.

Pre-Commercial Procurement

2010-11-17T16:39:00.007+01:00

DG INFSO proposes a new approach, the so-called pre-commercial procurement (PCP), another public-private partnership.

Cordis informs about the objectives of this initiative: "By acting as technologically demanding first buyers, public procurers can drive innovation from the demand side. In addition to improving the quality and effectiveness of public services this can help creating opportunities for companies to take international leadership in new markets".

Practically, these PCPs combine collaborative projects (CP) with a coordination and support action (CSA).

The CSA part allows the consortium of public bodies to define their needs and to launch a call for tender to the ICT industry to develop the required tools. Through this CSA, max 100% of the eligible direct costs inked to the preparation, management and coordination of the joint PCP call are funded, with an allowance of max 7% as a contribution to the indirect costs.

Additionally, the CP part foresees a reimbursement of maximum 50% of the eligible costs the public bodies incur for implementing the successful tender(s) to develop the new ICT solutions.

According to cordis, the following PCP calls are launched or planned:

1. Targeted calls for joint PCPs in specific areas of public interest (€3M each)
- ICT for health (Objective 5.3.(d), Call 7) - Topic: Services for mobile access to patient health info
- ICT for ageing well (Objective 5.4(d), Call 7) - Topic: Robotics solutions for ageing well
- Photonics (Objective 3.5.(d), Call 8) - Topic: Innovative photonics solutions improving quality and/or efficiency of public sector challenges

2. An open call for PCP proposals addressing any area of public interest (€5M each)
Proposals for joint PCPs in this open call (Objective 11.1, Call 8) can relate to for exampe public sector needs for new ICT solutions in healthcare, inclusion, e-government, transport, energy efficiency, environment, security, eduction etc

For more information, please contact Dunja Swierstra or Patrick Furrer at Euresearch or refer to the extensive PCP information provided on cordis.

"Ambient assisted living": Switzerland to participate

2010-11-11T11:39:00.002+01:00

Euresearch informs that on 20th October 2010 the Swiss Federal Council approved the participation of Switzerland in the “Ambient Assisted Living“ joint programme (AAL, www.aal-europe.eu).

The objective of AAL is to enhance the quality of life of older people and strengthen the industrial base in Europe through the use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT). The programme runs from 2008 until 2013 with a total budget of 700 million Euro.

As of 2011, all successful project proposers from Switzerland will profit from co-financing by the EU (FP7) and the Swiss federal government. The next call is expected to be launched in Spring 2011.

DG RTD: New name and structure

2010-11-11T11:31:00.002+01:00

SwissCore (Synopsis 2010/8) informs that the EC Directorate General "Research and innovation" is planning important changes to its structure.

The Director General of DG Research Robert-Jan Smits announced that from 27 October onwards the Directorate General’s official name changed to “DG Research and Innovation”. This reflects the strong focus on innovation that the EC is putting on its policies as part of the implementation of the Innovation Union.

Besides the new name, several staff changes and a broader reorganization of the Directorates are apparently planned for January 2011. Among the likely changes there has been talk of merging former Directorates B and C, which are in charge of issues relating to the European Research Area (ERA) into a new Directorate.

In one possible scenario, the current Directorate L “Science, Economy and Society” would also be incorporated into this new Directorate.

Another possibility would be to strengthen the activities in the field of innovation by regrouping several units under a single Directorate giving innovation a more coherent structure within the DG. In addition, the creation of a new special sector charged with the harmonized interpretation of rules and procedures has been announced. This new sector would be part of the simplification measures announced by the EC and should help coordinate the flow of information about rules and ensure a more coherent application of those rules.

EU patent

2010-09-06T16:22:00.004+02:00

After having had a debate on the issue of a Community patent for almost 40 years without a real result, the EU now wants to speed up the discussion. The Community patent is supposed to become one of the visible cornerstones of the new EU innovation strategy which has to be approved by the Council in autumn.

Upon request of the Council, the European Commission (EC) proposed on 1 July a translation system for the Community patent based on the three principle languages of the European Patent Office (EPO), which are English, French and German. The goal of using only these three languages is to reduce translation costs and to make patenting in Europe more competitive compared to the US and Japan. According to EC estimations the Community patent would cost no more than €6’200 of which only 10% for transla- tion. A European patent validated in 13 countries currently costs up to €20’000, of which nearly €14’000 in translation alone, which makes it ten times more expensive than a US patent.

The language regime for the Community patent will be the main problem the Council has to overcome. For the other pestering issue, the patent litigation system, the Council agreed already on 4 December 2009 on a proposal for a single patent court system.

As the adoption has to be unanimous, it will be crucial that Spain and Italy can be convinced to give up their opposition against the language rules which they consider discriminatory, as Spanish and Italian are not foreseen as official languages. Some other critics say that it is a mistake that the EU patent should exist in parallel to the current national and European patents. They propose that EPO and national patent offices should stop granting patents as soon as the EU patent exists. Some critics also argue that special provisions and reductions in entry fees should be made for young technology based companies applying for an EU patent or for SMEs in general (e.g. by creating special schemes for SMEs like in Japan and the US). (Source: SwissCore Synopsis 2010/7).

Third FP7 monitoring report

2010-09-06T16:21:00.005+02:00

The European Commission (EC) published its third FP7 Monitoring Report in July 2010. The report covers the period 2007–2009 and shows that participation patterns are stable over the first three years of FP7. So far, there have been:

• 170 concluded calls
• 55’000 proposals received
• More than 9’000 projects involving over 50’000 researchers funded
• €15 billion funds committed by the EC
• An average success rate of 22%

Projects funded under FP7 have included researchers from 162 countries. The most active outside the EU Members States and Associated Countries have been the USA, the BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China), Australia and South Africa.

The monitoring report shows that there has been important progress regarding gender equality in the participation in FP7. Women represent 20.5% of individuals characterized as “contact persons for scientific aspects” in signed grant agreements. Also, more than a third (36.1%) of Marie Curie fellows as well as 19.4% of the Principal Investigators in ERC grant agreements were women. Despite the increase in women’s participation, compared to previous Framework Programmes, the set target of 40% for all programmes and projects is still a long way from being reached.

SME participation for the three years since the start of FP7 is at 14.5%. Despite increased rhetoric about including more SMEs in EU research programmes, the rate is actually down since the last monitoring report. The average SME participation for the first two years of FP7 was 15.5%.

In the period 2007- 2009 a total of 771 ethic reviews were carried out. Not a single project was stopped on ethical grounds.

Out of 1’601 requests for redress received only 19 led to a re-evaluation.

While the overall image conveyed by the third monitoring report is a positive one, it should be kept in mind that the report is based on specific indicators that do not include stakeholder’s views on FP7. The strong calls for reform and simplification of FP7 rules and procedures indicate that there is significant room for improvement for the remaining years of the Framework Programme. The upcoming interim evaluation of FP7 should fine-tune the picture given by the monitoring report.

The full third FP7 monitoring report is available <a href="www.era.gv.at/attach/third_fp7_monitoring_report.pdf">here</a>.

(Source: SwissCore Synopsis 2010/7).

Simplification: The discussion continues

2010-09-06T16:20:00.006+02:00

The Belgian Presidency of the Council of the EU has committed itself to support simplification measures to FP7. On 14 July the Presidency organized a Simplification Seminar where experts discussed proposals with members of the European Commission (EC) and of the European Parliament (EP). The proposals ranged from short-term changes to grant management processes and procedures; over mid-term measures that involve changes to the financial regulations; to radical changes of the research funding system in place in Europe. In a hearing of the EP on 1 September, the question of simplification was further discussed and the Commission is expected to respond with concrete proposals until the end of the year. The Belgian Presidency wishes to present a set of conclusions on simplification during the Competitiveness Council on 12 October. (Source: SwissCore Synopsis 2010/7).

Swiss RTD Expenditure In 2008 At New Record

2010-08-18T17:01:00.000+02:00

According to the Federal Statistical Office, private enterprise, the Swiss government and the universities spent CHF 16.3 billion on R&D activities in 2008, setting a new record in Switzerland.

This is an increase of CHF 3.2 billion (+24%) over 2004. This R&D expenditure accounts for 3% of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), making Switzerland a country that is particularly active in the area of R&D.

The commitment of private businesses with a total of almost CHF 12 billion is the driving force behind R&D activities in Switzerland. The second significant player is the higher education sector, which spent slightly more than CHF 3.9 billion. Although the government is only of secondary importance in the execution of R&D in Switzerland, it is politically very important for the funding of this type of activity (CHF 3.2 billion).

Please refer to the report of the Swiss Federal Statistical Office for more details.

Robert-Jan Smits as new Director-General at DG Research

2010-06-08T14:40:00.000+02:00

On 3 June, the European Commission revealed the name of the new Director-General of DG Research.

Robert-Jan Smits, currently Deputy Director-General at DG JRC, will take over from José Manuel Silva Rodriguez as of 1 July 2010. The charismatic personality of Robert-Jan Smits and his knowledge of the European Research Framework Programme and its challenges are supposed to bring promising insights to the development of EU research funding in the coming years. Silva Rodriguez will remain as Advisor in DG Research.

In parallel, Françoise Le Bail currently Deputy Director-General at DG Enterprise will join DG Justice as new Director-General. The name of the person who will succeed her was not communicated yet.

NEF versus FORCE

2010-05-17T10:52:00.000+02:00

NEF, FORCE - two tools with very similar applications. The finance help desk recently published a comparison of these tools in their newsletter.

Both of these tools are accessed through the Participant Portal. NEF stands for "Negotiation Facility" (however, in fact, it covers Negotiation, Amendments and Periodic Reports). FORCE stands for "Form C editor" and is used for Periodic Reports.

It depends on which unit your project is with as to which tool is used to produce your Financial Reports. From the user's point of view, this choice is academic, as the correct tool will appear automatically from the project link in your participant's portal.

Here a summary of the NEF and FORCE usage:

- Negotiations: NEF is for all FP7 projects used to generate the Grant Preparation Form (GPF) and to access the legal information of partners involved in negotiated proposals such as contact persons, budget, bank account, and Description of Work
- Amendments: NEF is for all FP7 projects used to collect the information required to implement an amendment (mainly to implement budget restructuring)
- Periodic reporting: NEF is used to collect periodic reports such as cost declarations for a financial period in projects administered by DG INFSO, DG MOOV, and DG ENER. DG RTD uses FORCE for Periodic Reporting.

Please note that Firefox 3.x is not supported for both tools.

Commission to cut research funding red tape

2010-05-03T13:54:00.000+02:00

The European Commission has set out its plans to simplify the procedures for taking part in EU-funded research projects. The Commission hopes that cutting red tape in this way will entice the very best researchers to get involved in the framework programmes. In the following, parts of the EC press release are quoted. Read the full release here.

'I want researchers to spend more time in the lab and less time in the office,' stated Máire Geoghegan-Quinn, the EU Commissioner for Research, Innovation and Science. 'Our proposals aim to minimise administrative burdens in Europe's research programmes. We need to get the best researchers and most innovative companies taking part and we need to enable them to concentrate on results, not red tape.'

The simplification strategy, outlined in a Communication from the Commission, is split into three parts. The first part concerns changes that can be made under the current legal and regulatory framework. For example, better user support reduces the time taken to award grants and make payments.

The Commission has also committed to ensuring that rules are applied consistently and that calls for proposals and deadlines are timed to take into account major holiday periods. Finally, the Commission plans to investigate the use of prizes, noting that these are administratively simple to run and encourage other investors to spend money on research to win the prize. The Commission will run a pilot action for prizes under the Seventh Framework Programme (FP7).

The second strand of the simplification plan is devoted to more radical changes to the current financial rules. Both the European Parliament and Council must give the green light in order for these changes to take place. Ideas put forward here include a wider use of 'average cost methodologies', which would free projects from accounting separately for each small item of expenditure.

Recording personnel time for accounting purposes is cited as a problem by many grant beneficiaries; the Commission suggests paying a lump sum for personnel based on an agreement of the personnel costs during grant negotiations. The Commission also proposes allowing projects to use the same accounting methods for EU projects as they do for national research schemes.

The third and final part of the Communication concerns changes which could be implemented under future framework programmes. Here the Commission plans to explore options which would work on a 'payment by results' principle. 'The Court of Auditors itself has asked whether instead of the current system of 'payment by input', we could move towards 'payment by output',' explained Commissioner Geoghegan-Quinn. 'Agreed objectives would be set in return for funding. Payment of full amounts would be linked to whether those objectives are achieved.'

Mrs Geoghegan-Quinn emphasised that simplification could be achieved without compromising on financial control. 'I am a former member of the Court of Auditors,' she pointed out. 'I can tell you that multiplying different and overlapping procedures equals confusion. Clear and simple rules, consistently applied, equal good financial control.'