Abstract
Moving the ICT Frontiers for European Research: Strategies and Objectives
The European Commission funds multidisciplinary research on future information technologies through its overall research programme Future and Emerging Technologies (FET;
The success of this programme has contributed to European leadership in areas like quantum computing and communications, nanoelectronics, neuro- and bio-information science, and complex systems research, recognized by awards such as the Nobel Prize in physics to Albert Fert (France) and Peter Grünberg (Germany) in 2007 and to Theodor Hänsch (Germany) in 2005—all of whom have been partners in European high-risk research projects.
To put Europe in the best position to reap the great socioeconomic benefits from future developments in ICT, it is essential that Europe adopts a bold strategy to lead exploration and development of the foundations.
To define a strategy toward this goal, the European Commission recently prepared a document, “Moving the ICT Frontiers: A Strategy for Research on Future and Emerging Technology in Europe”
Strategies and Objectives
FET research seeds innovation and is essential for the sustainability of Europe's ICT industry by addressing roadblocks at the frontier of current technologies. These include coping with the “data deluge” and the increasing complexity of global systems, continuing miniaturisation of ICT components beyond the limitations of current technologies, and greening ICT. New paradigms must be explored and radical alternatives assessed to prepare the next generation of ICT technologies and to remove these roadblocks.
To do so, by 2015, Europe should aim to:
Double its investment in transformative foundational research in future and emerging technologies; Identify and launch two or three bold new FET research flagship initiatives, which will drive larger multidisciplinary research community efforts toward foundational breakthroughs at the frontier of ICT; Implement three to five joint calls between national and European programmes to support FET research in domains of common interest; Implement initiatives to empower talented young researchers to engage in and lead high-risk multidisciplinary collaborative research efforts; Implement initiatives to encourage research-intensive high-tech small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to develop and apply the early results from FET research.
Proposed Lines of Action
To achieve the above goals, the document proposes a combination of initiatives, described below, involving not only increased investment but also stronger coordination and collaboration between all stakeholders and new ambitious FET flagship initiatives. The final aim of the proposed lines of action is to attract the best researchers from around the world to Europe, to increase investment by industry, and to fuel innovation.
Reinforce FET under the ICT theme: Europe should reinforce its support for FET research under the ICT theme as an essential part of the research and innovation system. It should build up a critical mass of resources for predefined FET research initiatives (FET Proactive) with the potential for significant transformative impact. It should also step up its support for high-risk targeted research unconstrained by predefined research agendas (FET Open) as a platform for creativity and unconventional research ideas with the potential for significant impact and as an essential source of novel research topics. Launch FET flagship initiatives: Europe should prepare ambitious Europe-wide, goal-driven FET flagship initiatives that can combine large, sustained European research efforts on clearly defined foundational challenges, on a scale too large to be addressed by current FET initiatives. Engage in joint programming and FET ERA initiatives: Europe should coordinate national and EU-level efforts more closely to identify and support shared research priorities emerging from European research roadmaps. They could focus initially on domains such as quantum and neuro-information technologies where European research roadmaps exist, and then be gradually extended to other fields. Increase young researchers' engagement in FET research: The creativity and dynamism of young researchers are essential for challenging current thinking, for laying new foundations for future ICT, and for driving the success of such efforts over time. Europe should step up its efforts to attract young researchers, in particular young women, to FET research and to empower them to lead multidisciplinary research collaboration. Foster faster capitalization of scientific knowledge and speed up innovation: The research community and the European industry should intensify their dialogue in order to identify better industrial needs and technological bottlenecks requiring foundational research, and to ensure rapid take-up of early research results in application-oriented research. Participation by industry in foundational research should be encouraged. Facilitate collaboration with global research leaders and attract global talents to Europe: World-class global collaboration is needed if Europe is to address its foundational scientific research challenges. Europe should attract the very best scientists from all over the world to participate in FET research and settle in Europe. It should actively engage in and, where beneficial for Europe, financially support collaboration with the best research teams around the globe.