NMP

'Framework programmes' (FPs) have been the main financial tools through which the European Union supports research and development activities covering almost all scientific disciplines. FPs are proposed by the European Commission and adopted by Council and the European Parliament following a co-decision procedure.

In the Commission's amended proposals for FP7, it was proposed that the maximum overall amount for Community financial participation in the EC Seventh Framework Programme should be EUR 50 521 million for the period 2007 - 2013. For nuclear research and training activities carried out under the Euratom treaty EUR 2751 million are foreseen for 2007-2011.

The 6 main areas under FP7 are Cooperation, Ideas, People, Capacities, Euratom and the JRC's. It is in the Cooperation area that funding is provided for collaboration between Industry and Academia in 10 key technology areas. One of these thematic areas is Nanosciences, nanotechnologies, materials & new production technologies (NMP) and the EU Member States have earmarked a total of € 3.5 billion for funding this theme over the duration of FP7.

Under NMP emphasis will be given to the following activities:

Nanosciences and nanotechnologies - studying phenomena and manipulation of matter at the nanoscale and developing nanotechnologies leading to the manufacturing of new products and services.

Materials - using the knowledge of nanotechnologies and biotechnologies for new products and processes.

New production - creating conditions for continuous innovation and for developing generic production 'assets' (technologies, organisation and production facilities as well as human resources), while meeting safety and environmental requirements.

Integration of technologies for industrial applications - focusing on new technologies, materials and applications to address the needs identified by the different European Technology Platforms.

The European Commission will fund NMP research by selecting project proposals submitted following the publication of a 'Call for proposals'. The NMP thematic area uses a number of funding mechanisms.

LARGE, for large scale integrating projects where one of the eligibility criteria is that the minimum EC funding requested must be greater than €4 million.

SMALL, for small or medium-scale focused research projects, where the maximum EC funding requested must not exceed €4 million.

SME, for SME targeted Collaborative Projects. SME targeted projects have no upper or lower financial limits for EC contribution but projects will be assessed during the evaluation against the real work to be carried out in the project. The main criteria here is that the SME involvement is of the order of 35% or more of the requested EC contribution.

A number of other small schemes include Coordination and Support Actions (CSAs) and ERANETs. The NMP Thematic area is also involved in the Public Private Partnership Initiatives for “Factories of the Future”, “Energy Efficient Buildings” and “Green Car”.

For the LARGE, SMALL and SME funding schemes the evaluation follows a Two Stage Procedure. The first stage evaluates the Science and Technology (S/T) proposed and the Impact. This requires a proposal of 12 pages. 10 pages for S/T and Impact and 2 for Admin purposes. The proposal Coordinator usually does all the application work at stage 1.

If successful the applicants are invited to submit for stage 2 which evaluates S/T, Impact and Implementation (management). Typically this is 60 pages.

CSAs and ERANET proposals use a single stage procedure.

Proposals must be submitted electronically, using the Commission's Electronic Proposal Submission Service (EPSS). The system requires an applicant to input the administration data and upload a PDF of the main body of the proposal.

For Collaborative LARGE, SMALL and SME projects one of the main criteria is that there must be at least 3 independent legal entities involved in each proposal each of which is established in a Member State (MS) or Associated Country (AC), and no 2 of which are established in the same MS or AC. Associated Countries are Non-EU countries which are party to an international agreement with the Community such as Norway. A full list is available.

There has been some realignment with the release of calls across the various FP7 thematic areas (NMP, Health, Energy etc). The NMP call now gets published in July with a Stage 1 closing date for the main funding schemes of November. Evaluation of the Stage 1 proposals will be the following December / January with the successful proposals invited to submit the second stage proposal for the middle of May. For the current Call, launched on July 20th, the dates for the LARGE, SMALL and SME Funding schemes are:

• Publication of call. 20 July 2010
• Deadline for submission of stage one Proposals. November 4th 2010
• Evaluation of stage one proposals. December / January
• Coordinators informed of results of first stage evaluation. February 2010
• Deadline for submission of stage two proposals. 18 April 2011
• Evaluation of stage two proposals. May 2011
• Coordinators informed of results of stage two proposals. June 2011
• Signature of first grant agreements. From December 2011

The EU Commission provide a large range of documents relating to FP7.

For financial issues the most appropriate is "Guide to Financial Issues relating to FP7 Indirect Actions" and can be downloaded from here.

Summarising the Reimbursement rates:

RTD. Research and Technological Development activities.

HES. Higher Education Establishments.

RES. Research Organisations.

SME. Small and medium size enterprises. (<250 employees, with an annual turnover not exceeding €50million and /or has an annual balance sheet total not exceeding €43million).

Coordinatopn and Support Actions (CSA) may reach a maximum of 100%the total direct eligible costs. For indirect costs and it may reach a maximum of 7% of the direct eligible costs.

A full description on the Indirect costs used for FP7 can be downloaded here.

Following is a summary of the main points.

The reimbursement of beneficiaries shall be based on their eligible direct and indirect costs.

Indirect costs are all those eligible costs which cannot be identified by the beneficiary as being directly attributed to the project, but which can be identified and justified by its accounting system as being incurred in direct relationship with the eligible direct costs attributed to the project.

Indirect costs (overheads) can be calculated using Real Indirect costs or using a Flat rate of indirect costs.

Real Indirect costs are where an organisation has a certifiable method of calculating overheads.

Large Enterprises must report their Real indirect costs or choose the 20% flat rate option.

SMEs, Non profit public bodies, HES and RES organisations can use the Real Indirect method or the flat rate method.

Flat rate of 20%. This flat rate is open to any beneficiary whatever the accounting system it uses. Accordingly, when this option is chosen, there is no need for certification of the indirect costs, only of the direct ones.

Transitional flat rate of 60%. For SMEs, Non profit public bodies, HES and RES organisations. This flat rate is called a "transitional flat rate" because it will apply to grants awarded under calls for proposals closing before 1^st January 2010. The objective is to help the organisations during the transition from a flat rate calculation of their overheads to an actual cost calculation.