Irish SMEs should start chasing research opportunities that will arise following agreement this week over the European Union's £11.872 billion research budget, according to the head of the Commission's SME Co-ordination Unit.
Council of Ministers and EU Parliament representatives finally agreed the size of the Fifth Framework Programme research budget late Tuesday night after months of acrimonious negotiation. The way is now open for SMEs to take a share in this resource, according to Mr Robert-Jan Smits, who manages the group within DG12 which encourages SME involvement in collaborative research work.
The agreement, under discussion since last July, now awaits final sanction by the Council of Science Ministers on December 10th, but the figures are now fixed. More and more companies are taking part in the Framework Programme (FP), Mr Smits said with 12,000 involved in FP4, double the number who took part in FP3. This figure includes more than 200 firms from the Republic.
"SMEs are more and more finding their way into the Framework Programme," he said. "They are crucial for employment creation and crucial for competitiveness in Europe." Research companies must innovate to remain strong, he said and the Framework Programme helped them to do this.
Involvement in the programme entails establishing partnerships with companies and third level institutions elsewhere in Europe. The programme requires that there must be cross-EU research participation with academics and/or companies who receive funding to carry out research.
Companies in the State and academics are expected to have won £150 million from FP4 by the time it closes at the end of this year. The Minister of State for Science, Technology and Commerce, Mr Noel Treacy, has already predicted the State would gain a £200 million share of FP5.
"The Framework Programme is the only public instrument that provides internationalisation and access to new technologies. There is not a single national programme that offers both," Mr Smits said.
He stressed that size did not matter when it came to SME participation and even small companies could participate.
The EU profiled SME participants last month and the results included several surprises, Mr Smits said. The work was done by an independent Finnish contractor, Vertica Oy.
The survey found that the 300-400 employee companies were few and far between and 75 per cent of SMEs involved had 60 employees or less. Of those taking part in FP4, 64 per cent were "newcomers" with no previous involvement and 63 per cent had never taken part before in any regional, national or other international research programme.
The EU was now streamlining the procedures for SME involvement, he said. "On the basis of what we learned in the study we are going to create a single contact point for SMEs", rather than asking them to seek out access to individual programmes. It would be a "one-stop shop" and all documentation would be simplified. Feasibility study funding would also be available for small consortiums. The Republic he said, "has been doing rather well" under FP4 and he expected this to continue with FP5. SMEs in the State, he added, had to make decisions about involvement. "They have to make a strategic analysis whether it is worthwhile."
He proposed four questions which SMEs might ask: did the company export or was its home market under pressure from foreign competitors; was the company interested in innovation; was it willing to work on potentially commercial projects with partners; and was it willing to participate in an EU programme. "If the answers to these questions are yes then they are a potential participant in the Framework Programme."
The export aspect was central, he believed. While he was not saying that non-exporting firms should avoid involvement, "Those SMEs who get the most out if it have export markets." It was also valuable for companies working in a niche market who could no longer expand nationally and who were considering export markets as a way to grow.
