The European Commission recently announced the first calls for proposals under Horizon 2020, the European Union’s €80 billion research and innovation programme. Worth more than €15 billion over the first two years, the funding is intended to help boost Europe’s knowledge-driven economy, and tackle global issues that will make a difference in people’s lives.
This includes 12 focus areas in 2014/2015, including topics such as personalised healthcare, digital security and smart cities.
The budget in 2014 is worth around €7.8 billion, with funding focused on the three key pillars of Horizon 2020:
- Excellent Science: Around €3 billion, including €1.7 billion for grants from the European Research Council for top scientists and €800 million for Marie Skłodowska-Curie fellowships for younger researchers.
- Industrial Leadership: €1.8 billion to support Europe’s industrial leadership in areas like ICT, nanotechnologies, advanced manufacturing, robotics, biotechnologies and space.
- Societal challenges: €2.8 billion for innovative projects addressing Horizon 2020’s seven societal challenges, broadly: health; agriculture, maritime and bioeconomy; energy; transport; climate action, environment, resource efficiency and raw materials; reflective societies; and security.
Horizon 2020 is fully open to international participation in all fields and areas. Chinese researchers, enterprise and institutions are strongly encouraged to team up with European partners to make use of this opportunity in research and innovation. In addition, in the 2014 calls several topics are flagged for cooperation with China, for instance in the field of Food, Agriculture and Biotechnology, Information and Communications Technologies, and Energy.
For background and more information, please see:
MEMO/13/1085: Horizon 2020 – the EU’s new research and innovation programme