Research

Manufacturing is the most important source of economic development and growth. The economic importance of manufacturing goes far beyond its contribution to GDP, for which the European Commission has put forward a target of 20 %. The manufacturing industry in the EU is worth € 7.000 billion in turnover and it accounts for 80% of the total EU exports and 80 % of the private R&D expenditure. Moreover, it provides jobs for 30 million employees directly and is the source for twice as many jobs indirectly, the vast majority in small or medium-sized enterprises. To maintain its importance the industry in Europe needs modernisation. Last year the contribution of manufacturing to EU GDP has declined to 15.1 %. To be able to reverse this trend and start an Industrial Renaissance in Europe, we need more investment in innovation, resource efficiency, new technologies and skills. In the conclusions of the European Council of 20-21 March 2014, the Heads of State and Government underlined that industrial competitiveness should be at the centre of policy-making at all levels. It is an important signal for both the public and the business sector, to which they should respond with specific measures facilitating the industrial change. That’s why advanced manufacturing is one of the six priority areas for the modernisation of industry in the European Union. The market uptake of advanced manufacturing and clean technologies can improve productivity, resource efficiency and competitiveness in any manufacturing sector. To speed up this process a dedicated Task Force on Advanced Manufacturing for Clean Production was created in 2013. One year after its creation, the Task Force has drawn up a set of targeted actions aimed at advancing the European industry. In order to give Europe a competitive lead in the new industrial revolution, we need to engage in a partnership between the European Commission, Member States and industry. Europe needs industry and industry needs Europe. Get prepared for the future of manufacturing!

Urban issues are tackled in different Challenges of the Horizon 2020, the European Framework Programme for Research and Innovation. In Challenge 6 dealing with Inclusive, Innovative and Reflective Societies, a specific socio-economic item deals with “The promotion of sustainable and inclusive environments through innovative spatial and urban planning and design”. This publication highlights 10 stakeholders-based urban subjects to be addressed over the next years. It also provides a list of the EU urban research projects funded in the 7th EU Framework Programme (Social Sciences and Humanities; Sustainability and Environment; Transport and Energy; ICT; Smart Cities; and Security).

Forward looking activities (FLA) are used for the preparation and the formulation of EU policies.
Foresight and Forecasting allow to elaborate long term visions and to assess economic, social and environmental impacts of policies. Between 2007 and 2010 around twenty research FLA initiatives have been launched by the Seventh Research Framework Programme under the theme “Socioeconomic Sciences and Humanities” in the following fields: Globalisation, Europe and neighbouring countries; ERA (European Research Area), science, technology and innovation; Evaluation of policies and modelling of post-carbon society; Mapping, preferences, visions and wild cards.

This paper briefly outlines possible futures scenarios of science 2.0, analyses its implications and draws policy recommendations “fit for the future”. Science 2.0 is more than open access: it refers to the emergence of open, data-intensive and citizen science across the full research cycle, from data gathering to reputation management.
Science 2.0 is here to stay and it is already growing well beyond individual projects. On the supply side, an ecosystem of services and standards is emerging. Adoption is growing and becoming mainstream already in some phases such as preprint publication, reference sharing, open access publication. Impact is already visible and will address some of the most burning issues of science, such as the slowness of the publication process and the challenge of reproducing research results.
Based on the extrapolation of existing trends and on analogies from different domains, we anticipate a set of “scenario snippets”:
- The full integration of data, publications and intermediate product will enable reproducibility by default. But adoption of such sharing culture will require time and a new system of incentives based on impact metrics and career structure.
- Evaluation metrics will become multidimensional, granular and instantaneous;
- The work of scientist will change with greater collaboration and independence from institutions.
Overall, we will see an unbundling of services, which are today integrated. Research will be separated from teaching, data collection from data analysis, publication from reputation management. Different specialised service will emerge and displace the incumbents such as publishers and universities. At the same time, the value chain will reorganise through vertical integration around new platforms. These could be built around unexpected positions in the value chain, including electronic reading devices.
In terms of implications, these scenario show opportunities and risks in three main areas.

Open Innovation has been a growing topic of both practice and research for over a decade. The term originated from the USA but has spread globally into many industrial sectors. This paper has a number of purposes:
- To define Open Innovation, OI.
- Outline the history of Open Innovation and the evidence for its success or otherwise in promoting innovation and contributing to new industries.
- Discuss the connection with Forward Looking Activities (FLAs), Open Access and Open Source software.
- Discuss possible policy options for the EC in relation to OI.

EFFLA is looking to review the Horizon 2020 objectives and the related grand challenges in light of foresight with a long-term horizon. The intention of this research is to provide EFFLA with detailed understanding of key lifestyle trends in both Europe and the United States that are likely to challenge and change the current paradigm, societal structures, values, attitudes and practices in the long-term.
This research, done by Wevolve, a Helsinki and New York based research and strategy agency, consolidates the existing information and research material, such as reports, articles, trend publications, research articles and other existing information of the relevant shifts and trends. It identifies the key macro drivers of change and maps the relevant lifestyle shifts in values, attitudes and behaviors. The four key future lifestyle trends are Augmented and Programmed Lives, Culture of Production and Sharing, Resilient and Proactive Citizens, and The Quest for Purpose. All trends include relevant subthemes. Below is a summary of the main findings.

Europe is one of the global leaders in strategic foresight. From a continent that was mired in its own troubled and conflict‐ridden past, Europe has been gradually emerging over the past few decades as a region that wants to jointly and confidently embrace its future. The European Union is widely acknowledged as playing a key role in this transformation. Its very existence is forcing its member states and their citizens to explore new forms of governance in order to remain globally competitive in a future world that keeps changing at vertiginous speeds. Its high‐level initiatives such as ‘Europe 2020’ intend to push the European policy agenda towards ambitious objectives in areas such as employment, innovation, education, social inclusion and climate/energy. But nowhere is the forward‐leaning nature of the EU more visible than in the research area, where the European Union has been funding long‐term transnational framework programmes in many of the most promising fields of scientific discovery. The size and scope of many of these programmes are truly unique – even in comparison to analogous ones in the United States, Japan or (increasingly) China.
Foresight is an important ingredient in this overall research agenda. Across its different research priorities, the EU may very well fund more foresight work than any other actor in the world. And yet many of these efforts remain largely uncoordinated. Most research projects that address ‘the future’ tend to start from scratch and to do their own foresight work in their own fields with their own methods. This paper will examine whether it might be possible to develop a shared European future‐base by describing some experiences that were accumulated by a small European policy think tank from The Netherlands – the The Hague Center for Strategic Studies – that is primarily working in the field of strategic studies. HCSS has been performing foresight work for various (national and multinational) public and private customers for about a decade now, and has also started building a more systematic ‘future‐base’ containing insights from a broad variety of global foresight studies.
This paper will start by introducing the idea and the rationale behind such a ‘future‐base’, will then describe the method used by HCSS and present some examples from foresight studies published in 2012 in the field of security. It will conclude with a brief analogous analysis of a number of EU FP7‐funded studies in order to show how EU research priorities could be compared to some of the findings from a future‐base like exercise.

For this project, disruptive emergencies are defined as unplanned and non-routine events that have a significant consequence or impact on people, property and infrastructure, or could seriously damage the security of the EU. The impacts include harm to people (including psychological impacts), short or long term economic damage, and physical damage to property and the environment. Disruptive emergencies have been classified as either:
- Hazards - the results of nature or technical failure, including human error; or
- Threats - the results of terrorist or criminal activity (including state sponsored)
Disruptive emergencies do not include everyday occurrences, such as street crime.
The scope of the project includes emergencies that occur either within the EU (or are covered by the EU Civil Protection mechanism, such as the forest fires in 2007), or events outside the EU, that have a major impact within the EU, such as the potential break down of the energy system due to the decision to close nuclear plants as a result of Fukushima.
In undertaking this project I drew on my experience of undertaking FLA in the UK government and as a consultant; and experience of work on the preparedness for and resilience towards disruptive emergencies. This includes work on disruptive emergencies as part of the UK National Security programme (CONTEST) and the associated National Risk Register. I conducted desk research and interviewed a number of experts on the subject. I also took account of comments made following a presentation to the EFFLA Committee at the commencement of the project.
This report neither covers the provision of humanitarian assistance by the EU after emergencies; nor an assessment of future risks or an audit of the capability of DG Research and Innovation to respond to them.
There is lot of activity by Member States and the European Commission directed towards the anticipation of, preparedness for, response to and recovering from disruptive emergencies. The recommendations cover areas where DG Research and Innovation can contribute to these activities.

Europe 2020 Strategy “Promoting smart, sustainable and inclusive growth” places research and innovation at its core.1 The Strategy aims to promote smart, sustainable and inclusive growth. The Strategy, which proposes increased spending on R&D to 3% of total European GDP by 2020, is positioned as a key tool in implementing the Innovation Union2 -- a flagship initiative which provides a comprehensive set of actions for improved research and innovation performance through a seamless approach. Horizon 2020 – the Framework Programme for Research and Innovation3 is a key tool in implementing EU Innovation Flagship. Horizon 2020 brings together key funding streams for research within the European Union with a Budget of €90.4 billion (current prices) to establish a single specific programme for implementation with a single set of Rules for Participation and Dissemination. Horizon 2020 emphasises the links between research and innovation, proposing to fund activities throughout the innovation cycle. As such, Horizon 2020 will foster public-private partnerships, emphasise involvement of SMEs throughout the R&D and innovation activities, make available risk finance for early stage projects and commercialisation of new technologies, and provide for improved intellectual property management within EU. Horizon 2020 has identified three major focal areas for funding, namely, “Excellent Science”, “Industrial Leadership” and Actions to address “Societal Challenges”. Section Two of this paper briefly describes these three focal areas with more detailed description of the proposed activities within “Health, Demographic Change and
Wellbeing” theme within the Societal Challenges area. The paper then discusses in Section Three the key contextual challenges face by the European member states, followed in Section Four by a brief overview of EU health system responses to these challenges, with gaps that need addressing. Section Five of this paper proposes a number of areas for consideration for funding within Horizon 2020 activities, and briefly compares these with the priority actions identified within Health, Demographic Change and Wellbeing theme. A sub set of the proposed areas is identified as early candidates for funding, with a brief rationale for the proposition.

This report has been prepared in response to the invitation for a study on Secure, Clean and Efficient Energy, in support of the work of the European Forum for Forward-Looking Activities. The aim of this Study is to develop mechanisms for ensuring that Horizon 2020 takes account of a wide range and fuller set of challenges for the area under review. The scope of the study was broadly defined by the societal challenge in this area as set out in the proposal for Horizon 2020, summarised by the objective:
“The specific objective is to make the transition to a reliable, sustainable and competitive energy system, in the face of increasingly scarce resources, increasing energy needs and climate change.” (DS 1293/12, p.93)
The key questions addressed in this report are:
- Will the implementation of the SET-Plan help to link research and innovation programmes?
- Identification of the main challenges and sub-challenges in respect of the transition of the energy system;
- Comparison of these challenges with the announced broad lines of activities under Horizon 2020;
- Assessment of the extent to which these challenges are disruptive for the assumptions or proposals of Horizon 2020;
- Identification of any adjustments to the themes in the light of this; and
- Whether any important challenges or issues are missing from the announced broad lines of activities.