The perfect time to broaden your horizons
IT’S no secret that there is a direct correlation between innovation and business success. It aids companies to scale, to diversify into new markets and increase value. We know from research that diversifying export products through innovation plays a major role in scaling companies, and that investing in knowledge-based capital can help firms increase productivity performance.
We also know that a higher education sector and research system that is internationally engaged, and collaborating with Irish enterprise, is of critical importance for our global competitiveness. It’s why driving innovation in Irish enterprise and across the innovation system is a key pillar of Enterprise Ireland’s (EI) strategy.
Generous European funding is available to Irish enterprises and researchers to achieve this. Horizon 2020 is the largest European Union-led research and innovation funding programme, amounting to €75bn.
It provides an exciting platform for Irish enterprises to collaborate and compete with their European counterparts. It delivers a critically important source of funding to support Irish researchers to collaborate, and to advance excellence in science and address major societal issues.
Almost 1,900 applicants from Irish-based organisations have applied for funding to date. And Irish enterprises and researchers have secured funding of more than €800m, after competing against some of the most experienced researchers and innovative companies in Europe and beyond.
More than 56pc of this has been secured by the higher education sector, with more than a third secured by companies, including Enterprise Ireland clients, and the balance from other bodies engaged in research.
The level of funding secured is reflective of the talent in our higher education sector and in our most innovative companies.
Ireland is well-placed to continue to benefit greatly from the programme. The opportunities for funding will run until the end of 2020, and cover a diverse range of technologies and research at different levels of maturity. The opportunities for international collaboration are significant.
Irish participants collaborate with researchers from a range of countries, with the highest-level research collaborations coming from Germany, Spain, the UK and France.
For example, we are seeing the Athlone Institute of Technology coordinating a project in the area of ‘bioinnovation for a circular economy for plastics’ that involves other Irish institutions and researchers from countries including Germany, Belgium, Spain and China.
EI recently held a conference at University College Cork, where we brought together innovators, researchers, public authorities and companies active across the converging disciplines covering low-carbon technologies, climate resilience and the circular economy.
Last week, EI supported the embassy of the republic of Lithuania to Ireland in hosting an Irish-Lithuanian researchers’ brokerage and networking event, focusing on Horizon 2020 research calls in the areas of information communications technology and health.
We recently saw the first call for applications under the new pilot European Innovation Council (EIC). This Horizon 2020 initiative allows companies to apply for up to €2.5m in grant funding, and up to €15m in equity funding, to turn science and research into new business and accelerate the scale-up of innovative firms.
The EIC is the successor programme to the SME Instrument, where many EI high-potential startups, including Restored Hearing, Coroflo, Perfuze and CroíValve, were successful in winning competitive funding.
All innovative Irish startups should be looking at this opportunity.
EI has also been successful in winning Horizon 2020 funding for the benefit of clients and the Irish research system.
This has allowed us to launch the Career-Fit Plus Cofund, to award a total of 50 fellowships to highly skilled researchers to conduct a project of 36 months in Ireland — working closely with Irish enterprises, technology centres and qualifying technology gateways. Applications for this competitive opportunity close in December.
Although the size of the programme can be daunting for some, the opportunities are significant. My advice is for researchers and companies to engage with the Horizon 2020 National Support Network, led by Enterprise Ireland, where we offer experience and unrivalled expertise. It can be a hugely beneficial resource for both new and seasoned applicants. There has never been a better time to broaden your horizons.