By Milena Marchesi
Over the last few years, European research and innovation have received a considerable boost from the European Commission’s Horizon programme, which is the largest transnational research and innovation programme in the world. Horizon funds researchers at universities, as well as innovative projects by organizations, SMEs and public entities. Recognizing that research benefits from international engagement, the Horizon Europe programme is also open to many non-EU countries.
The first Horizon programme, Horizon 2020, ran from 2016 to 2020. With a budget of € 77 billion, H2020 funded almost 32,000 grant agreements and 160.837 entities. Horizon Europe, which is slated to run from 2021 to 2027, has an even bigger budget than its predecessor, € 95.5 billion, and can be expected to have an even broader impact in areas that the European Commission has identified as its strategic priorities.
These include: addressing the climate change crisis through the European Green Deal (35% of Horizon Europe’s budget is devoted to research and innovation related to climate change); supporting a sustainable and more equitable economy; boosting Europe’s global competitiveness and digital autonomy; supporting a democratic Europe; and contributing to the continent’s recovery from the Covid-19 emergency.
MISSION
New to Horizon Europe is the introduction of five “missions”, which are meant to be overarching objectives orienting the programme and which can be found in Horizon Europe’s logo. Each mission will issue calls specific to its topic, with the first calls, described below, expected to open in May 2021:
• Adaptation to Climate Change Mission: Funding for Better prepared regional and local authorities to adapt to climate change (budget: € 5 million).
• Cancer Mission: Grant funding for “Preparing UNCAN.eu”, a European initiative to understand cancer (budget: € 3 million)
• Healthy Oceans Mission: Preparation for the deployment of ‘lighthouse demonstrators’ and solution scale ups and cross-cutting citizen and stakeholder involvement (budget: € 5 millions).
• Climate Neutral & Smart Cities Mission: Will support the transition towards climate neutrality within cities will see two grant topics opening, both of which aim to support
the transition toward climate neutrality in European cities (budget: € 4 million).
• Soil, Health & Food Mission: ‘Preparing the ground for healthy soils: building capacities for engagement’ will fund actions aimed at building and disseminating knowledge about soil health (HORIZON-MISS-2021-SOIL-01).
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HORIZON EUROPE: PILLARS, PROGRAMMES AND ACTIONS
Beginning with Horizon 2020, the Horizon programme has been organized into three pillars that organize different programmes and facets of its research and innovation ambition: European
world-class research (Pillar I), innovation (Pillar II), and the application of research and innovation to address critical social issues (Pillar III).
Pillar I
“Excellent Science”—supports cutting-edge scientific research, particularly through the European Research Council, but also the Marie Skłodowska-Curie fellowships. In addition, Pillar I
includes the Research Infrastructures programme, which, as its name suggests, funds state-of-the-art research infrastructures as well as e-infrastructures across Europe. The budget for Pillar I is set at € 25.8 billion.
Pillar II
Pillar II is organized around six “clusters”: Health; Culture, Creativity and Inclusive Society; Civil Security for Society; Digital Industry and Space; Climate, Energy and Mobility; Food, Bioeconomy; Natural Resources, Agriculture & Environment. These clusters, which are further organized into Destinations and Calls, reflect the European Commission’s priorities of addressing climate change, furthering the continent’s digital capacities, as well as the health and wellbeing of its citizens and
societies.
In addition to the six clusters, Pillar II also supports several cooperative agreements between the European Commission and private and public partners, the so-called European Partnerships, which are also organized around specific themes: health; digital, industry and space; climate, energy and mobility; food, bioeconomy, natural resources, agriculture and environment. The Joint Research Center, which conducts research in support of the EU policy-making process, is also located in this pillar.
Pillar III
“Innovative Europe”—funds innovation in the private sector particularly as it concerns small and medium enterprises. This pillar includes three programmes: the new European Innovation Council (EIC), which follows the success of the 2018- 2020 pilot programme Enhanced European Innovation Council, the Ecosystem for Innovation programme, and the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT). The most important programme in Pillar III is the European Innovation Council (EIC).
The EIC supports cutting edge and disruptive technologies developed by innovative companies— startups, SMEs as well as research teams—which may otherwise struggle to obtain private funding due to the pioneering nature of the technologies they are developing. The programme prioritizes technological innovations that have the potential to further Green Deal objectives and bolster Europe’s recovery from Covid-19. The EIC includes different kinds of instruments:
• The “EIC Pathfinder” will provide grants for projects at the early technology and pre-commercial stage. The Pathfinder includes the FET-Open and FET-Proactive instruments and offers grants up to 4 million euros to fund collaborative and interdisciplinary research and innovation across three Member States. Pathfinder grants cover 100% of eligible costs.
• The “EIC Accelerator” previously the SMEs instrument, will provide two different kinds of funding—grants and blended financing—to support pre-commercial to market and scale up projects by innovative SMEs. Grant awards range between € 0.5 and € 2.5 million, while blended financing awards can be as high as € 15 million.
• The “EIC Fast Track to Innovation” (FTI), for mature and market-ready projects. Consortia of 3-5 partners can apply for financing up to 3 million euros with up to 70% cofinancing for private sector entities but up to 100% for non-profit ones, including municipalities.
• Finally, the “EIC Horizon Prizes” which grant awards of up to € 10 million for innovative attempts to solve pressing problems.
The total budget for Pillar III is set at € 13.5 billions.
ELIGIBILITY, TIMELINE, TYPES OF ACTIONS
Eligibility for Horizon Europe varies by programme and grant call. However, any organization with a legal personality established in a Member State or territory is eligible. The most common beneficiaries of the Horizon programme include:
• Private for-profit entities (especially SMEs)
• Higher education institutions and research entities
• Non-profit organizations
• Public entities
Funding rates for Horizon Europe also vary by programme. Horizon Europe’s “Global Challenges and European Industrial Competitiveness” component (Pillar II) includes three types of actions: Research & Innovation Actions (RIA), Innovation Actions, (IA), and Coordination and Support Actions (CSA). Familiarity with these actions is critical for grantseekers as the type of action informs the scope of the project, funding rates and evaluation and award criteria:
• Research & Innovation Actions (RIAs) fund basic and applied research that promises to generate new knowledge or technologies. This action requires transnational partnerships among entities from at least three EU Member States. The funding rate is 100%.
• Innovation Actions (IAs) fund technology that is near market-ready but is in need of improvement. Eligible projects include the creation of prototypes, testing, and demonstration. This action requires transnational partnerships among entities from at least three EU Member States. The funding rate is 70% (except for non-profit entities, which are funded at 100%).
• Coordination & Support Actions (CSAs) fund activities related to coordination, networking, communication and dissemination and studies. CSAs do not require transnational partnerships and single entities are eligible to apply. The funding rate is 100%.
Programmes for individual researchers, like the ERC (Pillar I), or funding for SME innovation (Pillar III) may have other funding schemes, as described above. All Horizon grants include a 25% overhead scheme on top of the award to cover indirect costs.
INTERESTED IN HORIZON EUROPE?
The Horizon programme makes up a substantial portion of EU grant funding. The road to an eligible and successful Horizon Europe application begins with an understanding of the programme structure and of the European Commision policy priorities that are reflected in its themes. The Horizon programme is highly competitive, however. Horizon 2020 received almost a million applications of which less than a third were judged eligible. The success rate of those proposals was around 11%. These statistics underscore the importance of developing a project proposal that closely addresses the call topics and requirements.
If you’re just getting to know the programme, or you’ve considered participating before but were daunted by its requirements, you should know that the European Commission has sought to streamline both the application and the grant management processes, such as by shortening application lengths and simplifying accounting requirements. With the first calls sets to open in June, this is a good time to head over to the European Commission’s Funding & tender opportunities portal where calls are published and applicants can find, among other useful documents, links to work programmes, application guidelines, model grant agreements and the Electronic Submission Service, or check out our latest edition of the FUNDED Magazine -V1-1.
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