Trans-national cooperation among Marie Skłodowska-Curie National Contact Points (NCP) 2021

Projects are expected to contribute to the following outcomes:

• An improved and professionalised NCP service across Europe, thereby helping simplify access to Horizon Europe calls, lowering the entry barriers for newcomers, and raising the average quality of proposals submitted;
• ​Harmonised and improved trans-national cooperation between NCPs;
• More consistent level of NCP support services across Europe and beyond, notably in widening countries;
• Increased participation of third-country NCPs in the activities of the action.

The objective is to facilitate the trans-national co-operation between National Contact Points (NCPs) for the MSCA, including those established in Third Countries, with a view to identifying and sharing good practices and raising the general standard of support to applicants, taking into account the diversity of actors and experiences.

Support will be given to a consortium of formally nominated MSCA NCPs. The activities will be tailor-made to the needs and priorities of the NCPs concerned and may include benchmarking, joint workshops, enhanced cross-border brokerage events, training sessions linked to the MSCA and wider R&I priorities and tools, twinning and mentoring schemes. Special attention will be given to enhancing the competence of MSCA NCPs, including helping newcomers and less experienced NCPs to rapidly acquire the know-how accumulated by their peers. Cooperation with other EU networks such as Euraxess Worldwide, Enterprise Europe Network, COST, will be encouraged to increase the visibility to potential beneficiaries, especially in the non-academic sector.

Addressing the R&I gap

There still is a research and innovation gap across Europe and discrepancies remain between European countries in their capacity to attract funding and researchers. This gap is observed in the MSCA as well. Particular emphasis on continuing the efforts to close this gap will mark the first years of the MSCA under Horizon Europe. Therefore, specific measures to support the NCPs in “widening countries,” such as training and mentorship schemes, should be organised to stimulate more high-quality applications with beneficiaries in these countries and increase their success rate in MSCA.

Attract researchers from third countries

The MSCA are the main EU instrument to attract researchers from Third Countries to Europe. Specific measures to encourage Third-Country NCPs to create contacts and participate in the activities of the project (e.g. training, twinning, mentoring, and other capacity building and networking activities) should be foreseen.

The focus throughout should be on issues specific to the MSCA and should not duplicate actions foreseen in the NCP network under “Widening participation and strengthening the European Research Area”.

The consortium should have a good representation of experienced and less experienced NCPs and include NCPs from widening countries.

Submission of a single proposal is encouraged. NCPs choosing not to participate as a member of the consortium are nevertheless invited and encouraged to participate in the project activities (e.g. workshops).

The expected duration of the action will be 36 months.