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Co-funding of regional research fellowship

programmes by FP7 Marie Curie Actions

Martin Lange

Policy Officer

DG Education and Culture

Unit C3, Marie Curie Actions

European Commission

FP7 Research Potential and Regions of Knowledge programmes, Brussels, 22/09/2012

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Collaborative research

10 thematic areas

Frontier Research

ERC

Capacities : M€ 4097

People : M€ 4750

Marie Curie Actions

Research

Capacity

Cooperation :

M€ 32 413

JRC : M€ 1751

Euratom : M€ 2751

Nuclear research

Ideas :

M€ 7510

FP7 breakdown (€ million) – 2007-2013

Total FP7 budget : M€ 50 521

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Some basic about Marie Curie Actions:

• Addressed to researchers at all stages of their

careers

• Open to all domains of research (bottom-up)

• Mobility (international, intersectoral, interdisciplinary)

• Application through competitive calls for proposals

• Budget covers generally:

salary, mobility and research budget for the

researcher

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Marie Curie Action Objective

Initial training of researchers (1900 M€)

Initial Training Networks (ITN)

Improve career perspectives of

early stage researchers in both

public & private sector

Life-long training and career development (1170–1400 M€)

Intra-European Fellowships (IEF) Career development of experienced

researchers by e.g.: diversification

skills/competencies; integrate a

stable position after mobility

Career Integration Grants (CIG)

Co-funding of regional, national, international programmes (COFUND)

Industry dimension (250-450 M€)

Industry-Academia Partnerships and Pathways (IAPP)

Open and foster dynamic pathways

between public research

organisations and private

commercial enterprises

International dimension “World fellowships” (1170–1400 M€)

International Outgoing Fellowships (IOF) Reinforce extra-European

dimension of the ERA through

mobility through training,

knowledge transfer and

cooperation

International Incoming Fellowships (IIF)

International Research Staff Exchange Scheme (IRSES)

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Researchers On the Move

Pierre and Marie Curie honeymoon, 1895

0

5000

10000

15000

20000

25000

30000

35000

1996-1998 1999-2002 2002-2006 2007-2010 2011-2013

1996-2010

50 000 Marie Curie Researchers

• 50.000 researchers from over 120 nationalities since 1996

• 40% women

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– Public bodies

– Private bodies with public mission

– International organisations

responsible for funding and managing fellowships or

research training programmes

For example: ministries, research academies, research

funding agencies, universities

COFUND: Who can apply?

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COFUND: eligibility criteria (1)

– Fellowship Programmes can only fund experienced

researchers; they must be either

• doctorate holders

• or have >4 years research experience

– Researchers have to show transnational mobility:

• incoming from another country

• outgoing to another country

• (re)integration into research employment in Europe after

period of transnational mobility

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COFUND: eligibility criteria (2)

– Beneficiaries must be established in a EU Member

State or Associated Country to FP7

– COFUND allows:

• Creation of new transnational fellowship programmes

• Opening of existing programmes to transnational mobility

• Increasing number of transnational fellowships currently

awarded by an existing programme

• Improving working/research conditions of fellows

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– EU contribution: 40% of fellowship costs

– Max. € 10 million per organisation per call

– Duration: 24-60 months

– Supported fellowship programmes receive label co-

funded by Marie Curie actions

– Researchers selected by fellowship programmes

are Marie Curie Fellows

COFUND: What does the funding cover?

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COFUND: What topics can be funded?

– Bottom-up approach: all domains of research and

technological development are eligible

– Fellowship programmes can cover several or all

fields of research or can be restricted to a specific

domain

– However, programmes should have sufficient

impact in the specific scientific field(s)

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COFUND: Evaluation and selection

– Organisations managing fellowship programmes

send application to yearly call for proposals

– Proposals are evaluated in independent peer

review, based on pre-established criteria

– Proposals are evaluated in two separate panels:

• Panel A: existing transnational fellowship

programmes (including those opening for the first

time for transnational mobility)

• Panel B: new transnational fellowship

programmes

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COFUND: Evaluation criteria

– Quality of the selection process for the

fellows under the programme

– Implementation - Management of the

programme

– Relevance and Impact to “Life long training

and career development”

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What happens after the evaluations?

– If proposals are selected for funding, Research

Executive Agency (REA) negotiates yearly flat-rate EU

contribution per fellow-year

– Organisations sign grant agreement with REA

– Organisations run co-funded fellowship programmes

independently from EC and REA, with own

application/selection rules and financial contribution

rates to fellows

– Co-funded programmes report annually to REA

– Financial reporting exclusively based on flat-rates, not

on actual costs

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COFUND - overview

Call Call

closure date

Call budget

M€

Eligible proposals

Proposals retained for

funding

Success rate

Co-funded fellow-years

Co-funded fellows

FP7-PEOPLE-2007-2-3-COFUND

13/3/2008 65 45 24 53.3% 2682 1647

FP7-PEOPLE-COFUND-

2008 19/2/2009 75 35 26 74.3% 2406 1461

FP7-PEOPLE-2010-

COFUND 18/2/2010 75 53

32 (some still in

negotiation) 60.4%

2803 (prelim.)

1613 (prelim.)

FP7-PEOPLE-2011-

COFUND 17/2/2011 90 64

19 (in negotiation)

29.7% 2355

(prelim.) 1132

(prelim.)

Total 305 197 101 51.3% 10246 5853

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Participation of regional organisations

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

regional organisations national organisations international

organisations

# s

ele

cte

d f

ell

ow

sh

ip p

rog

ram

mes

universities

research

organisations

non-research

organisations

16

0

500

1000

1500

2000

2500

3000

3500

2007 2008 2010 2011

call

# f

ell

ow

-years

international organisations

national organisations

regional organisations (incl universities)

Participation of regional organisations

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Examples regional COFUND programmes

– Czech Republic: South Moravian Region

– Spain:

• Catalonia (AGAUR)

• Bizkaia (Bizkaia:xede)

• Galicia

• Aragón

• Basque (IKERBASQUE)

– Italy: Provincia Autonoma di Trento

– UK: Royal Society of Edinburgh

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Examples regional COFUND programmes

– TRENTINO Fellowship Programme:

• Existing fellowship programme since 2003 (only incoming)

• COFUND allowed:

– increase in number of incoming fellowships (30 Fellow-years)

– introduction of outgoing (65 Fellow-years) and reintegration

scheme (25 Fellow-years)

– improve the fellows' working conditions (employment

contracts)

• EU contribution: € 2.66 Mio

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Examples regional COFUND programmes

– Belgium: VIB

– Switzerland: Zürich-Basel plant Science Center

– Spain:

• Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG)

• Ciber de Diabetes y Enfermedades Metabolicas Asociadas

• August Pi i Sunyer Biomedical Research Institute

• Institut de Ciencies Fotoniques

• Institute for Research in Biomedicine

• Universitari Vall D„Hebron

– Italy:

• Fondazione Bruno Kessler

• Fondazione Centro San Raffaele del Monte Tabor

• Istituto Superiore di Sanità

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COFUND – next call

– FP7-PEOPLE-2012-COFUND

• Date of publication: 19 October 2011

• Deadline: 15 February 2012

• Budget: EUR 110 million

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More information

List of COFUND Fellowship Programmes:

ec.europa.eu/research/participants/portal/page/cofund

Information on Marie Curie Actions:

ec.europa.eu/research/mariecurieactions/

Martin.LANGE@ec.europa.eu

EAC-Unite-C3@ec.europa.eu

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THANK YOU

FOR YOUR

ATTENTION

http://ec.europa.eu/mariecurieactions