Unite for Horizon Europe Erasmus Project

Project Title

Unite for Horizon Europe

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for higher education

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2020

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Cooperation between educational institutions and business; Research and innovation; International cooperation, international relations, development cooperation

Project Summary

While an increased participation has been observed in the Horizon 2020 programme compared to FP7, the European Commission is looking to “raise the bar in the quality and widening of participation” in the Horizon Europe programme period. It particularly concerns the involvement of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in innovation partnerships as the latter have been reported considerably low. Many SMEs continue to struggle to adopt the right strategy, business processes, skills, or other resources to get involved in European funding partnerships. Participation of the higher education institutions (HEIs) and research organisations, on the other side, in the Horizon 2020 has been the strongest among others. However, their involvement is deemed to be further enhanced by the provision of tailored support for collaboration with a more diverse range of stakeholders. In this light, the availability of supportive engagement training programmes is crucial, especially considering the success rate of the proposals in the Horizon 2020 framework (11.9%) and missed opportunities for more strategic cooperation that could be established between HEIs and SMEs.
In respect to the status quo outlined above, the goal of the Unite for Horizon Europe (UNITE4H) project is to help build strategic engagement capacity between European academics/researchers and SME representatives to increase the proportion of successful collaborative participation in the Horizon Europe initiatives. We believe an increased engagement between HEIs and SMEs, as well as foundations and other stakeholders around targeted Horizon Europe projects will NOT ONLY help deliver on a united approach to societal challenges, but ALSO help strengthen the means of funding for HEIs to be able to concentrate their efforts on the entire innovation cycle from research to market.
The project consortium will achieve this goal by breaking it down into the following objectives:
1. identifying the engagement needs and challenges experienced & collaborative opportunities envisioned by the academics and SME representatives across Europe
2. (developing a Horizon Europe engagement-training programme to increase awareness, skills and knowledge capacity among academics and SME representatives
3. validating the training programme via pilot testing and workshop sessions
In line with each of the objectives, expected results of the project are as follows:
(IO1) Horizon Europe Engagement Programme Framework: The output will build on in depth research on the status-quo of European academics and SME representatives’ engagement skills and competences, as well as facilitators, challenges, and perceived partnership opportunities for Horizon Europe funding framework. The research will involve (i) desk research (ii) interviews (60+ interviews with experts and professionals, i.e. academics, SME representatives, engagement professionals, European funding programme experts) and surveys (600+ participants among target groups) and (iii) good practices of successful HEI-SME partnerships (30+) identified among the funded Horizon 2020 projects. The results of the research input will be then analysed and compiled into the Horizon Europe Engagement Programme Framework.
(IO2) Horizon Europe Engagement Training Programme and Toolkit: Building upon IO1, this output will involve the activities of (i) conceptualisation and development a Horizon Europe Engagement Training Programme with customised modules for HEIs and SMEs, (ii) preparation of teaching resources and facilitator guides, (iii) organization of the resources into the initial version of the Engagement Toolkit
(IO3) Horizon Europe Engagement Training Validation Report: The programme developed will be pilot tested in the three partner HEI and three SME regions, with the training to be delivered to 45+ academics and 45+ SME representatives, which is followed by feedback collection from both participants and the trainers, as well as the finalization of the Engagement Toolkit supplementing it with the additional information received during the pilot testing process.
The project results will be disseminated extensively to the target groups across Europe, and further showcased both throughout and after the project, via workshop sessions during national launch events and partners’ own conferences. The results will not only have impact on the individual level with the academic development and career advancement of the participants, but also on the institutional level, where the HEIs and SMEs will build awareness on mechanisms they can put in place for collaborative innovation, as well as at the system level, where the European research priorities are more effectively addressed through international strategic collaborations between HEIs and SMEs.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 240010 Eur

Project Coordinator

G&T.G NOVATEX SOLUTIONS LTD & Country: CY

Project Partners

• Crazy Town Oy
• UNIVATIONS GMBH
• UNIVERSIDAD CARLOS III DE MADRID
• INSTITUT MINES TELECOM BUSINESS SCHOOL
• UNIVERSITY INDUSTRY INNOVATION NETWORK BV
• MEATH COUNTY COUNCIL