With a proposed budget of €86.6 billion (2018 prices) or €97.6 billion (current prices), the future framework programme for research and innovation, Horizon Europe, will benefit from an increase of almost 50% compared to the programme that went before it, Horizon 2020, the European Commission states.
Nonetheless, the overall allocation for research at European level, as unveiled by the European institution when the EU draft budget for post 2020 was presented early May, threw cold water on the hopes of the scientific community (see EUROPE 12013). And the odds are that the tabled proposal will be trimmed down still further by member states that are expected to tie up a unanimous agreement on the EU budget after 2020.
Speaking on Monday 7 May, Mathilde Reumaux of the Science Europe organisation, the European network of national research funding agencies and several research centres said it was “disappointing”. Aware of how difficult it is to develop the post-2020 multiannual financial framework, Business Europe advocated a greater level of ambition. The organisation’s director general, Markus J. Beyrer, states in a press release: “We acknowledge the Commission’s efforts to increase spending on research and innovation activities but would have liked to see even more ambition”.
Until a few weeks ago the Commission was counting on between €120 to €160 billion for the Horizon Europe allocation. That sum, moreover, was what the Lamy report had supported in July 2017, recommending that funds allocated to research should be doubled (see EUROPE 11821). The European Parliament, for its part, was banking on a financial envelope of at least €120 billion (see EUROPE 11981).
According to the Commission, however, if one adds to the Horizon Europe allocation the funding allocated to the research chapters of the future Digital Europe programme, the Connecting Europe Facility, the Euratom programme and the ITER project, the threshold of €120 billion in current prices is reached.
Once the United Kingdom has become a third country once more, it is likely its participation in Horizon Europe would be accompanied by an additional financial allocation from the British who are the primary beneficiaries of Horizon 2020.
Evolution rather than revolution
As its new name indicates, the Horizon Europe programme will be evolution rather than revolution.
With Horizon 2020, “we have built a global reputation as a world leader in research and innovation programming, and it is for this reason that we believe the successor to Horizon 2020 should capitalise on this strong brand name”, European Research Commissioner Carlos Moedas says in his blog following the presentation of the EU budget for post-2020, early May. He goes on to add: “With Horizon Europe, we are enacting an evolution not a revolution”.
On Wednesday 6 or Thursday 7 June, the Commission will, among other things, set up a European agency for groundbreaking innovation on the American Darpa model. This idea was floated by Emmanuel Macron during his speech on the future of the European Union at Sorbonne University, in September 2017 (see EUROPE 11870).
The French president is expected to reiterate his proposal during the informal dinner devoted to research and innovation for the EU heads of state and/or government, in Sofia on Wednesday 16 May, the day before the informal summit with the Western Balkans. Such discussions at the very highest level should already have been held during recent summits.
The American decision to go back on the nuclear deal with Iran may, however, still upset the agenda (see related article).
Speaking end April during the presentation of the European strategy for artificial intelligence (see EUROPE 12009), Moedas said “our approach is a little different from that of Darpa”. He considers the US agency is very vertical from top to bottom. Upon being contacted by EUROPE, an expert in Brussels defending fundamental public research interests also spoke of problems of an “ethical” nature, saying Darpa is mainly active in the military sphere.
Prospect of a European innovation Council
Given that there is no European agency for groundbreaking innovation, Horizon Europe will place special emphasis on innovation, especially by creating a European Innovation Council.
“A new global wave of breakthrough innovation is coming up, one that will be based on ‘deep-tech’ technologies such as block-chain, artificial intelligence, genomics, robotics. (...) Europe has to ride that wave”, the Commission says in its draft decision establishing Horizon Europe, dated 19 April and of which EUROPE has a copy. Europe should therefore take up the challenge to improve the transformation of fundamental research results in commercial applications given that, in this field, it is lagging far behind its American and Asian competitors.
The European Innovation Council will therefore aim to “identify, develop and deploy” breakthrough market-creating innovations and to “support the rapid scale-up of innovative firms at EU and international level”. To achieve this, it will have two complementary instruments: a Pathfinder for advanced research and an Accelerator for commercialisation of breakthroughs.
The Pathfinder will earmark grants for high risk projects for exploring new scientific fields, or demonstrate that discoveries may result in concrete activities.
The Accelerator will provide financial support for marketing innovations through: - advances that are not always reimbursed; - EU direct investment in equity, generally lower than 25% of the total capital except in sensitive areas such as cyber-security where minority blocking can be envisaged, the Commission says, or: - public guarantees intended to soak up the first potential losses of a project.
The use of risk capital will be promoted when it comes to funding technological innovation. Early April, the Commission announced the creation of the pan-European VentureEU fund, which will aim to double investment in risk capital intended to support the creation of start-ups in Europe and their expansion (scale-ups) (see EUROPE 11998). Also, synergies will be foreseen with the future InvestEU fund intended to stimulate the competitiveness of European business.
New missions for improving social well-being
Several experts take the view that the identification of scientific missions of a societal nature is the main innovation of Horizon Europe. “The appearance of missions - that is one of the two main innovations”, said Reumaux.
The expert, Mariana Mazzeucato, defined this idea, which gives concrete substance to one of the recommendations set out in the Lamy report. She defined it as follows in a report to the Commission in February, saying: “The mission oriented approach” is “systemic public policies that draw on frontier knowledge to attain specific goals” that can be measured in the medium-term.
Such policies will provide a clear working direction while enabling a bottom-up approach, she said. They would stimulate multi-disciplinary collaboration with a view to finding answers to societal questions.
“The approach is interesting for giving guidelines for major challenges and for communicating better on certain objectives”, said Alexandre Affre, the director for industrial affairs within BusinessEurope. He also welcomed the combination of financial support via Horizon Europe and private investment in the context of future missions.
The missions - which would be reduced in number to a handful initially - would make it possible to communicate more easily with citizens on the theme: “Europe tackles your everyday problems”.
Mazzucato speaks of public health missions, clean urban transport and the cleaning up of the oceans. It should be noted that the EPP Group at the European Parliament recently spoke of its dream that Europe should be able to conquer cancer by 2040, an idea that the higher Commission spheres applaud (see EUROPE 12009).
According to one expert, the whole difficulty of the exercise will boil down to “governance and evaluation” of approved missions. Although it is easy with Horizon 2020 to identify project leaders depending on the excellence of their application and the quality of the consortium set up, the criteria for selecting a project portfolio within one and the same mission are still, at this stage, “mysterious”, he said.
Excellence does not rhyme with cohesion
There are also other challenges for Horizon Europe. The increase in the direct financial allocation and synergies envisaged with other funding sources aims, among other things, to prevent the European research programme from becoming converted into an instrument that produces disappointment.
Horizon 2020 has been “victim to its success”, said Affre, alluding to the large number of projects presented but which were finally turned down.
Another question is raised: How can one strike a fair balance between research of excellence, the fundamental criterion for the European research programme for most member states, and the resolve of other states to place framework programmes for research more at the service of economic and territorial cohesion?
Between 4% and 5% of Horizon 2020 beneficiaries come from central and eastern Europe, the expert states. Research workers from these countries naturally seek a better future in western Europe, which, as a consequence, means that research capability in eastern Europe remains limited. Excellence, however, is not the system which allows a better breakdown of research opportunities in the EU, he adds. (Original version in French by Mathieu Bion)