Testing of the ERA Hub concept – pilot phase
HORIZON Coordination and Support Actions
Basic Information
- Identifier
- HORIZON-WIDERA-2022-ERA-01-30
- Programme
- European Research Area
- Programme Period
- 2021 - 2027
- Status
- Closed (31094503)
- Opening Date
- January 19, 2022
- Deadline
- April 20, 2022
- Deadline Model
- single-stage
- Budget
- €5,500,000
- Keywords
- EntrepreneurshipInternational cooperationRegional developmentEconomic impactSocietal impactInnovationPrivate investmentSmart Specialisation strategiesKnowledge and Technology transferValorisation and capacity buildingecosystem creationacademia-business cooperationaccess to investments in innovationplace-based innovationERA
Description
Projects are expected to contribute to the following outcomes:
- Test the new ERA Hubs[1] concept across different geographies and structures in Europe, based on common compliance criteria; the process should act as an incentive for advanced ecosystems to seek recognition, and for less advanced ecosystems to reach the criteria facilitating support from European, national and regional level.
- Better coordinate relationships between the European Research Area and relevant national or regional stakeholders in order to ensure the smart directionality introduced in the new ERA.
- Develop a common platform for collaboration and best practice sharing across borders, sectors and disciplines on knowledge production, circulation and use, and facilitate cross-fertilisation and smart directionality among ecosystem actors to achieve transformative changes and advance Europe together.
- Increase both the interoperability of the European ecosystems and the intra-operability within each territorial ecosystem, aiming to improve coordination, and foster excellence.
- Facilitate a better circulation and absorption of talents in countries/regions, as well as improve knowledge circulation and uptake of research results;
- Provide a toolbox of best practices for researchers, innovators, industry and institutions across Europe to cooperate.
A vibrant ecosystem is an essential condition for growth. In order to take full advantage of possible synergies and complementarities between the EU and national and regional ecosystems for knowledge production, circulation and use, there is a need to make compatible and interoperable the policy frameworks that govern existing structures for knowledge transfer and sharing, and address common criteria for assessing work, processes and outputs. Reinforcing the networking interconnecting geographically or thematically, the ecosystem actors on the basis of smart specialisation and other strategic considerations, such as value chains, will consequently stimulate excellence and complete the coverage across Europe.
This action should build on the preparatory work of the previous Work Programme on Knowledge Ecosystems, which provides among others a mapping of existing ecosystem actors engaged in knowledge production, circulation and use across Europe, as well as designing the ERA Hubs concept as a toolbox of pre-defined common standards of work, processes and outputs, and key performance indicators on operational, programme and strategic impacts. The concept should be tested on collaborations, platforms, or other structures bringing together ecosystem actors, and increase networking between those structures in a coordinated approach, around a common agenda and compliance criteria. The rollout of the concept across Europe is expected to support and coordinate the efforts at local and regional level for the implementation of a pan-European ERA Hubs initiative.
The scope of this action is to pilot the ERA Hub concept with a limited number of ecosystems through implementation in countries and regions where knowledge ecosystem structures aligned to the ERA Hubs concept already exist, combined with countries or regions where an integrated place-based approach is missing. The main goal of the action is to fine-tune through experimentation the designed concept of ERA Hubs and its technical specifications and compliance criteria, share practices, as well as provide a toolkit of best practices and activities that ensure a strong basis for a potential scale-up in different geographies across the EU territory in the next phase.
Projects will be assigned to entities or networks of structures involved in knowledge production, circulation and use activities at European, national, regional or city level, which should take the coordination role in orchestrating the actors of an ecosystem working together to implement the ERA Hubs concept, in pursuit of intra-operability with the territorial ecosystem and a common agenda supporting the economic transitions and smart specialisation strategies, as well as job creation and skills development to better absorb talent in a country or region. These structures could be entities that have the competences and/or the willingness to become pioneers, benchmarks and ambassadors of the new concept and should include higher education institutions or their tech transfer offices, research institutes, business schools, private companies, not for profit organisations, or entities already part of pan-European networks or coming from different funding communities, in order to better connect those communities.
Support from institutional, regional, or national sources is highly encouraged (proven through e.g. letters of commitment), in order to make considerable progress in the deployment of the ERA Hubs initiative in the respective country or region.
The action should include the development of an independent monitoring mechanism to assess the progress of the ecosystem actors engaged in a common agenda and implementation of the ERA Hubs concept in a dedicated country or region. On the basis of the assessment, projects should also provide recommendations on how to deploy the ERA Hubs in different geographies and regions.
[1]See COM(2020)628, Commission Communication, A new ERA for Research and Innovation
Destination & Scope
Introduction
Horizon Europe has a new level of ambition – to maximise the impact of EU research and innovation funding for European science, economy and the wider society. It marks a paradigm change in the design of the EU R&I Framework Programmes (FP) from an activity-driven to an impact-driven programme. Coupled to this ambition is the relaunching of the European Research Area (ERA) as described in the recently published Commission Communication entitled A new ERA for Research and Innovation (COM/2020/628 final of 30.09.2020).
The COVID-19 pandemic demonstrates the importance of R&I cooperation to deliver solutions to society’s most demanding needs. Delivering Europe’s recovery is a priority as are the green and digital twin transitions. To match these challenges, a new level of ambition that links better R&I with the economy, as well as with education and training, is necessary to put the EU’s scientific knowledge to work.
The new ERA calls for deepening existing priorities and initiatives through new and stronger approaches. The green and digital transitions and the recovery call for cooperation between the Commission and the Member States. They require the setting of new priorities, launching ambitious joint initiatives and developing common approaches between policies.
To address these requirements, Destination 3 of Annex 11 of the Horizon Europe Work Programme, will support efforts to reform and enhance the EU R&I system. Destination 3 is built around four strands corresponding to the four objectives set out in the ERA Communication: 1. Prioritise investments and reforms; 2. Improve access to excellence; 3. Translate R&I results into the economy and 4. Deepen the ERA. The principle of excellence, meaning that the best researchers with the best ideas that respond best to the societal challenges obtain funding, remains the cornerstone for all investments under the ERA.
Strand 1 recognises the importance of prioritising investments and reforms to accelerate the green and digital transformation and to increase competitiveness as well as the speed and depth of the recovery. It offers support for policy makers and addresses the need for better analysis and evidence, including simplifying and facilitating the inter-play between national and European R&I systems.
Strand 2 addresses the need to improve access to excellence and to increase the performance of R&I systems, building on dedicated Horizon Europe measures as well as complementarities with smart specialisation strategies under the Cohesion Policy.
Strand 3 addresses the importance of translating R&I results into the economy. R&I policies should aim to boost the resilience and competitiveness of our economies and societies.
Strand 4 addresses the challenge of deepening the ERA and includes Open Science, Higher Education and Researchers, Citizen Science, Science Education, Gender and Ethics. It aims at underpinning a new ERA benefiting from knowledge creation, circulation and use. This empowers higher education institutions and research organisations to embrace a transformative process; where a highly skilled workforce circulate freely; where research outputs are shared; where gender equality is assured; where the outcomes of R&I are understood, trusted and increasingly used, by educated informed scientists and citizens to the benefit of society.
Expected impact:
Proposals for topics under this Destination should set out a credible pathway to contributing to the following expected impacts:
- Reform and Enhance the EU R&I system
- Prioritisation of investments and reforms, realisation of the recovery and the twin transitions
- Improved access to excellence
- Greater quality of the scientific production and stronger translation of R&I results into the economy
- Deepen the ERA
- Coordinated national and regional R&I programmes by pooling national resources and contributing to the alignment of national research and innovation policies
- Improved knowledge for policy making about the networking patterns of research support staff and research management
- Synergies between research & innovation and higher education policies and programmes
- Modernised higher education sector, benefitting from targeted transformations in higher education, research, and innovation
- Increased number of interconnected knowledge ecosystems, strong in knowledge creation, circulation and use
- Researchers benefit from attractive careers
- Inclusive gender equality is promoted in the European research and innovation system
- A more open and inclusive research and innovation system
- Increased capacity in the EU R&I system to conduct open science and to set it as a modus operandi of modern science
- Increased engagement of citizens with research and innovation
- Increased alignment of strategic research with society needs, expectations and values
- Identified synergies between second and third level education, and between education and business;
- Increased trust in science and R&I outcomes, and greater two-way communication between science and society
- Knowledge and a highly skilled workforce circulate freely
- Improved capacities within the EU R&I system to conduct open science
- A more open and inclusive research and innovation system
Eligibility & Conditions
General conditions
1. Admissibility conditions: described in Annex A and Annex E of the Horizon Europe Work Programme General Annexes
Proposal page limits and layout: described in Part B of the Application Form available in the Submission System
2. Eligible countries: described in Annex B of the Work Programme General Annexes
A number of non-EU/non-Associated Countries that are not automatically eligible for funding have made specific provisions for making funding available for their participants in Horizon Europe projects. See the information in the Horizon Europe Programme Guide.
3. Other eligibility conditions: described in Annex B of the Work Programme General Annexes
4. Financial and operational capacity and exclusion: described in Annex C of the Work Programme General Annexes
5. Evaluation and award:
- Award criteria, scoring and thresholds are described in Annex D of the Work Programme General Annexes
- Submission and evaluation processes are described in Annex F of the Work Programme General Annexes and the Online Manual
- Indicative timeline for evaluation and grant agreement: described in Annex F of the Work Programme General Annexes
6. Legal and financial set-up of the grants: described in Annex G of the Work Programme General Annexes
Specific conditions
7. Specific conditions: described in the specific topic of the Work Programme.
Documents
Call documents:
Standard application form — call-specific application form is available in the Submission System
Standard application form (HE CSA)
Standard evaluation form — will be used with the necessary adaptations
MGA
Call-specific instructions
Essential Information for Clinical Studies
Additional documents:
HE Main Work Programme 2021–2022 – 1. General Introduction
HE Main Work Programme 2021–2022 – 12. Missions
HE Main Work Programme 2021–2022 – 13. General Annexes
HE Framework Programme and Rules for Participation Regulation 2021/695
HE Specific Programme Decision 2021/764
Rules for Legal Entity Validation, LEAR Appointment and Financial Capacity Assessment
EU Grants AGA — Annotated Model Grant Agreement
Funding & Tenders Portal Online Manual
Support & Resources
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Horizon Europe Programme Guide contains the detailed guidance to the structure, budget and political priorities of Horizon Europe.
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Latest Updates
Please note that the cross-cutting priority on Africa is not relevant for the topic “HORIZON-WIDERA-2022-ERA-01-30 - Testing of the ERA Hub concept – pilot phase”, and was removed from the topic description on the funding & tenders opportunities portal page.