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SCIENCE FOUNDATION IRELAND ANNUAL REPORT 2015
Economic Impact
Strong economic impact was delivered by Science Foundation Ireland and the community we support in 2015. While we invested € 154 million in 2015 across our research programmes, the researchers we supported attracted a further € 130 million in international and industry funding to support their research. Science Foundation Ireland awards support 1,220 collaborations with industry, these involve 372 multinational companies and 437 SMEs. Positively, we estimate that this involvement and combined significant investment has an economic impact on the Irish economy by directly and indirectly supporting 28,000 jobs.
Our support of 38 conference and workshops in 2015, which involved 4,784 international delegates also had a projected economic value for Ireland of € 4.8 million, all of it supporting the local economy.
Leveraging EU Funding
Winning competitive grants from the EU, e. g. Horizon 2020, is another key indicator of the health of the Irish scientific system; ERC and H2020 awards are highly competitive and require both innovative and collaborative skills. In 2015, Science Foundation Ireland-funded researchers secured € 79 million in EU funding, triple the 2014 funding.
Science Foundation Ireland-supported investigators had a successful year with respect to ERC awards. The 2014-2015 calls saw three SFI-funded Starting Grant winners, four SFI-funded Consolidator Grant winners and four Proof of Concept grants, totalling € 13.1 million.
Ireland now hosts 58 ERC grantees( 20 women and 38 men) with total EU funding worth approximately € 97 million. The top three hosting institutions are Trinity College, University College Dublin and the National University of Ireland, Galway. Science Foundation Ireland catalyses and assists ERC applicants through its ERC Development and Support Grant programmes and will continue to place emphasis here.
In 2015, Science Foundation Ireland increased its involvement in further ERA-Net calls as they are crucial to initiating and maintaining Irish engagement in the most successful cross-European partnerships.
Science Foundation Ireland is committed to supporting H2020 wins through a number of initiatives including supporting competitive bids for Irish researchers in industry and academia to coordinate large projects.
The SFI Investigators Programme in 2015 was aligned to areas of common interest with H2020, in collaboration with a number of other Irish research funders, and these proposals are currently under review.
Science Foundation Ireland approved 62 H2020 Catalyst awards in 2015 which are intended to support activities that seek to build EU consortia and teams for future H2020 applications.
Partnership and Collaboration
12 SFI Research Centres of scale and excellence have been established with an investment of € 355 million from Science Foundation Ireland, and a further € 190 million from industry partners committed over the next six years. Many of these were officially launched in 2015. The existing SFI Research Centres have been further supported via additional funding for nine major projects through the SFI Spokes Programme to a cumulative value of € 23 million.
A further SFI Research Centres Call is planned in 2016, which should bring the number up to the planned 15-20 Centres, enabling us to fully support government priority areas.
In 2015, our US Ireland R & D Partnership agreement with the National Science Foundation in the US, and authorities in Northern Ireland, was extended to facilitate collaborations between Research Centres in the three jurisdictions – namely the 12 SFI Research Centres, the NSF Engineering Research Centres and Research Centres in Northern Ireland.
Agreements with UK funding agencies, the Royal Society and the Wellcome Trust, have produced joint funding opportunities in 2015 and a new partnership established with the BBSRC will see the first call for proposals in January 2016. A partnership with the EPSRC is under discussion. Science Foundation Ireland also signed agreements with funding agencies from Brazil to cement future collaborations between researchers in Brazil and Ireland. Similar partnerships in China and Japan are in discussion.
Science Awareness, Engagement and Outreach
To guide and inform our awareness, engagement and public outreach efforts around science, and ultimately to measure our progress, we commissioned and conducted a number of pieces of research.
The Science Foundation Ireland- Science in Ireland Barometer 2015, showed that public attitudes towards STEM and investment in science and innovation were positive. It also identified a number of areas we need to address, including the geographical location of our activities, girl’ s perceptions of science and more generally,‘ the fitting in’ factor on particular courses.