Talk in Brussels is?turning to?the European Union¡¯s next research and development programme, which will run from 2028 to?2034 ¨C and while much remains undecided, a?consensus is?forming that it?needs to?focus more on?early-stage research.

For the past 10 months, a?committee co-chaired by the European Commission and made up of?directors general from the science ministries of EU and Horizon Europe-associated countries has been debating the next framework programme, currently known as?FP10.

A committee task force is working on a formal position, due to be debated in spring 2024 and formally adopted in June that year.

The group has agreed a ¡°vision¡± for the programme, which includes its international political context and its overall structure, and they have just began debating the detail, with the ¡°most important¡± aspect so far being the relative share of fundamental and applied research the programme should fund.

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¡°There are a lot of people who say the balance in Horizon Europe is a bit broken, [that] it went a bit too far towards high TRL, towards knowledge exploitation,¡± a Brussels embassy science attach¨¦ for an influential EU country told Times ÖйúAƬ, referring to ¡°technology readiness levels¡±, a?measure of a given technology¡¯s maturity or closeness to market.

EU research programmes have tended to fund more applied work since they began in the mid-1980s, the attach¨¦ said, noting that in recent years they had been joined by other sector-specific programmes such as Digital Europe, the European Defence Fund and EU4Health, which also fund research.

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According to the attach¨¦, the ¡°fundamental question¡± was whether the next framework programme should pursue EU goals in these areas, or whether its sister programmes should take on responsibility for sector-specific research.

The European Parliament¡¯s lead on the programmes, Christian Ehler, has called for a €200?billion (?174?billion) budget for FP10, roughly double that of the current programme.

¡°Either we get a framework programme with €500?billion, and then it can do everything from knowledge creation to knowledge exploitation, or we say, ¡®We focus the research programme more on?research.¡¯ That¡¯s the dilemma,¡± the attach¨¦ said.

¡°If we solve the interplay between all the programmes, then a lot of pieces of the puzzle will start to fall into place, including the money.¡±

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The most recent iterations of the programme have had three ¡°pillars¡±, with the first funding excellent research, the second collaborative projects and the third innovation.

The directors general committee invited university groups and other lobbyists to a meeting in September to give their take on FP10. Laura Keustermans, who represented the League of European Research Universities, and Sarika Wilson, who represented the Guild of European Research-Intensive Universities, said there had been some consensus between the countries and the guests on Horizon Europe¡¯s overly high TRL levels, particularly in the programme¡¯s second pillar.

¡°There is no balance any more between research and innovation; it¡¯s going too much towards the innovation side. To be able to continue to feed this innovation process, it¡¯s important there is more fundamental research in pillar two,¡± Ms?Keustermans said.

In July last year, the commission to compare the funding for early-stage research in Horizon Europe¡¯s second pillar with that in its predecessor, Horizon 2020, although the officials¡¯ response .

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Ms Wilson noted that the second pillar had swollen in Horizon Europe to take up half the programme¡¯s overall budget, but that it was increasingly focused on short-term goals.

European universities and science ministries also seem united in their frustration over the flexibility of the framework programmes¡¯ budgets, citing the commission¡¯s ability to pinch funds for pet political projects.

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ben.upton@timeshighereducation.com