FP7 an opportunity for Irelands researchers

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FP7 an opportunity for Irelands researchers

• Dr Imelda Lambkin

imelda.lambkin_at_enterprise-ireland.com
353-1-727 2665http//www.fp7ireland.com
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What is it?

• European Commission's instrument for supporting
  RD
• Running from 2007-2013
• Budget of over 50 billion
• FP7 covers everything from ICT and bio through to
  energy, environment, space, security etc
• If you are looking for research funding there is
  something in it for you
• If you are looking for something else its there
  for you too

1st ICT Call was biggest ever - 1 billion
Industry-led joint technology initiatives
emerging
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Whats going on in Ireland?

• National Support Network spans all research
  funding organisations
• We gave out more financial support in 1 year than
  in the whole of FP6
• Several thousand attendees at promotion and
  training events
• 1000 proposals submitted in 1st 10 months!
• gt200 successful bringing in over 50 million
  (access to 300m RD)
• Higher education remains the primary beneficiary
  (65)
• But funding to industry looks good at 24 -
  providing access to 144m worth of RD most
  going to SMEs (83) few MNCs participating

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ICT, health and nanotech account for 65.4 of the
funding
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TCD received most funding, WIT shows IoTs how to
do it
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Ireland versus other countries?
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Some key messages

• A very strong first year
• A need to build FP7 relationship with National
  Research Funding
• Scope to incentivise Repeat Performance and Scale
  Up
• Room to improve MNC participation
• A revised outlook for Ideas-ERC
• Good potential to exploit Marie Curie Co-fund
• Potential to internationalise outreach programmes
  in Science in Society

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A new cross-departmental network spanning 12
organisations it is very easy to work together
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A new and dedicated web-based system for the
network we have developed the tools for sharing
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FP versus national sources
Where do we want to position FP7?
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FP7 high performers

• Tyndall Institute
• Strong performance in FP7 but opportunities in
  broad range of areas outside ICT and NMP not
  considered in detail
• ICT participation of relatively low financial
  value
• No real uptake of Marie Curie potential to use
  Co-fund
• Conway Institute
• Under-performance in FP7 opportunities in broad
  range of areas outside Health not considered in
  detail
• Some PI-specific uptake of Marie Curie

Is FP7 participation strategic?
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Leverage of national funds

• DERI
• Multiple proposals 7 project successes in first
  ICT calls gt 2 million
• SFI DERI has been very successful in FP7 with
  7 projects funded
• FP7 NSN DERI participation has been PI-driven
  rather than strategic, it is ad-hoc and varies
  widely in terms of ST quality.

Can we share information to challenge research
centres more efficiently?
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FP providing people

• ERC
• 127 applications from Ireland (total 9000 3
  success rate )
• 2 Starter Grants in a very competitive
  environment Chemistry, Anaesthesiology

Should we link FP7 success to funding decisions
in national agencies? Who sees the FP7
participation data and how do they use that
information?
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FP providing people

• Marie Curie
• 2 Irish research funders (IRCSET Health Research
  Board) and one third level institution (RCSI)
  successful in the first Co-fund Call
• 40 funding by EC for the establishment of (or
  expansion of existing) national mobility-based
  fellowship schemes
• Maximum funding available per proposal of
  5million

New developments such as this have the potential
to substantially impact on FP7 targets and to
draw research funders in
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Research funders in FP7

• EI, SFI, HRB, EPA, IRCSET, IRCHSS participating
  in FP7
• General EC move towards Joint Programming
• International Research Fund for provision of
  national funding to academic research
  participants in co-funded European programmes
  established at Enterprise Ireland

Maximum benefit to Irish participants from
European Programmes will be achieved only by
rapid response to the changing environment
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First step in our strategy for Scale Up

• FP7 NSN launching pilot scheme for financial
  support for Strategic Approaches to FP7 by
  Research Centres/Groups
• To fund up to 5 research centres/groups to
  develop and implement 12 month strategic
  approaches to FP7 participation
• Targeted use of the FP7 offering to build
  collaborative research projects and/or form
  collaborative networks and/or build research
  capacity and/or obtain or provide access to
  international research infrastructures as part of
  research centre/group strategy

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Next step in our strategy for Scale Up

• Need for scale up within the strategic research
  agendas
• Need route to better communication with national
  research funders and probably formal linkage of
  FP7 success to funding decisions in national
  agencies
• Need for national agencies to take up co-funded
  European programmes
• Need to ensure FP7 performance is not giving out
  mixed signals
• Need to use FP7 information sources effectively

New HERG Working Group???