Latest Science|Business news & analysis
Welcome to the weekly Science|Business roundup of the most significant news in R&D policy and funding, tailored for our LinkedIn audience.
In this week’s main R&D policy news:
The board of the European Innovation Council (EIC) says the European Commission should set up a marketing campaign to attract US start-up founders and staff turned off by Donald Trump this year. Meanwhile, the Federation of American Scientists says Europe should press ahead with schemes to attract US scientists, as this will preserve research areas and careers currently under attack.
Back in Europe, French president Emmanuel Macron says the EU must ensure that decades worth of research data and knowledge are not “lost to science” at a time when Donald Trump is ransacking the US science sector.
In other news, the European Parliament is calling for a stronger EU budget capable of helping companies become more competitive within the single market. The non-binding document supports a standalone FP10 and rejects the European Commission’s proposed Competitiveness Fund.
The academic community has pushed back against conclusions drawn from an interim evaluation of Horizon Europe, published on April 30, Juliette Portala reports. Where the European Commission sees evidence of sound investment, with every euro spent so far yielding up to €11 in GDP gains by 2045, university groups find the unfunded 70% of excellent research proposals as sign of limited ambition.
Finally, member of the EIC board Lars Frølund explains why Europe should embrace dual use innovation and seize the opportunity to build leading companies in critical technologies.
Read the key highlights from this week’s Policy Bulletin:
In funding news:
Goda Naujokaitytė reports on the €500 million package that the EU will invest to make itself “a magnet for researchers” as it positions itself to attract the best international talent, particularly from the US.
Across the Atlantic, Richard L. Hudson, our editorial director, looks into the Trump administration’s cuts to medical-research projects funding involving foreign labs, which risks disrupting clinical trials.
Back in Brussels, Martin Greenacre tells us what we need to know about the European Commission’s plans to launch eight partnerships in strategic areas such as solar power, innovative materials and brain health. He also analyses how a voucher system to incentivise the development of new antibiotics would cost 45% less than previously thought, thanks to changes suggested by the European Parliament.
Elsewhere, we dig into the first assessment of the African Union-EU Innovation Agenda, which was agreed in 2023 and already shows a few small signs of deepening ties between the two blocs.
In the Funding Radar, we have a list of biomanufacturing-related funding calls.
In the Data Corner, we find that there was a stark contrast in the distribution of Horizon Europe funding across northern and southern Italian regions between 2021 and 2024.
Read the key highlights from this week’s Funding Newswire:
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