Under this call, the European Commission will award up 2 M€ to map and assess thematic links between MSCA projects and their contribution to several EU policy priorities. It will also gather feedback from MSCA’s research and innovation community on how to maximise the programme’s impact.

Deadline: 3 September 2024

One of the objectives of this action is to support ongoing and planned European Commission initiatives that focus on exploiting and assessing the impact of Horizon 2020 and Horizon Europe projects results in relation to thematic and cross-cutting priorities, including the EU Missions. It also aims to assess the extent to which MSCA projects achieve two of the core horizontal policy objectives of the programme: the development of researchers’ training, skills and career and the related promotion of intersectoral collaboration.

This call should be seen as a pilot to map areas and types of intervention for possible similar actions in the future that will support a broader policy feedback process.

The maximum duration of the action is 48 months.

Activities

The activities should contribute to strengthening complementarities between ongoing MSCA projects, especially with a view to better exploiting their results and maximising their impact vis-à-vis the specific thematic and cross-cutting priorities.

Activities should therefore include the contribution and impact of MSCA projects in relation to:

• The EU Missions and societal challenges they address;
• Researchers’ skills development, including but not limited to the skills needed to tackle the thematic areas of the Missions;
• Cooperation between academic and non-academic organisations, with the emphasis on the business sector.

Deliverables

The expected deliverables should include a combination of analytical reports, ad hoc policy briefs, stakeholders’ events and meetings, policy roundtables and different communication and dissemination support actions, such as:

• Studies, analyses, reports looking into trends and developments in MSCA;
• Consolidation of projects results for policy feedback and communication and dissemination purposes;
• Dissemination and networking activities using the results of cluster events and communities of practice identified for the events; consulting project beneficiaries on policy needs, dissemination based on reports and feedback from cluster events; providing input into coordination of cluster events (e.g., suggesting themes, format and structure of cluster events);
• Synthesis of coordination activities linked to policy feedback and the improved exploitation of MSCA projects results: e.g., preparatory briefings, follow-up reports, feedback consolidation linked to MSCA cluster events, ad hoc policy briefs and monitoring of exploitation opportunities.

Supporting information

More information and applications can be found in the EU Funding & Tender Portal (topic: HORIZON-MSCA-2024-FTP-01). The European Commission is also organizing info sessions on this call. You can still register in the one that will occur on 29 May (online).

If you are considering to apply, please get in touch with us (cesam-gesciencia@ua.pt).