Horizon Europe Programme: Teaming for Excellence

Teaming is one of the actions that stimulates the European Union to exploit its potential by maximizing and spreading the benefits of research and innovation. It is vital for its competitiveness and its ability to address societal challenges.

The Teaming action is designed to support the creation of new centers of excellence or modernizing the existing ones in low R&I performing countries (except those centers of excellence that have already benefitted from previous Teaming calls). It is building on partnerships between leading scientific institutions in the European landscape and the main beneficiary institutions in low R&I performing countries that display the willingness to engage together for this purpose. This can help countries that are lagging behind in terms of research and innovation performance attaining a competitive position in the global value chains. Leading scientific institutions are established strategic partners that have developed an outstanding reputation in research and innovation excellence in the chosen scientific domain. Institutions that are still in the process of development or modernization, e.g., those that are still receiving support as coordinators from widening actions under Horizon 2020 or Horizon Europe, are normally not considered leading institutions, unless a proper justification is provided in the proposal.

In order to maximize impact of research and innovation on society, environment and economy at large and to contribute in particular to the achievement of the European Union’s objectives, funding must be coherent and work in synergy. This notion is highly relevant for the Teaming action, where a complementary source of funding from a national (or regional or European or private source) is required. The implementation of Teaming action is expected to become an influential and meaningful bridge particularly between smart specialization strategies and excellence in R&I with the aim of strengthening the European Research Area and contributing to the Sustainable Development Goals.

Proposals invited to the second stage must include an investment plan for the full project including a binding commitment for the necessary complementary funding. At a detailed level the full proposal should:

• Present a strategy for how the center will develop excellence in the chosen relevant R&I domain that will put it at the competitive edge beyond the state of the art enabling future success in competitive calls;
• Demonstrate the growth potential and expected socio-economic outreach of the Centre of Excellence for the benefit of the host country or region;
• Demonstrate how the project will contribute to encouraging and supporting reforms of the R&I system at regional and or/national level;
• Elaborate on the structure of the consortium and how this will create a win-win situation;
• Demonstrate how the newly established/modernized center will have full autonomy in decision-making. In particular, the center of excellence should have the maximum degree of autonomy in terms of taking its own decisions, being in legal, administrative, operational, personnel and academic matters. The Centre should be able to fix and pay competitive salaries for its personnel;
• Elaborate on the steps that will be taken to ensure long-term self-sustainability after the end of the Horizon Europe grant;
• In case of modernization of an existing center, convincingly elaborate on the development path from the initial baseline situation until the end of the project;
• Propose a robust human resource strategy that addresses gender equality (in line with the research institutions respective gender equality plans) and international component, ensuring appropriate management capacities for the effective and efficient running of the center of excellence.

Expected Outcomes 

• Project results are expected to contribute to all of the following expected outcomes:
  • Increased scientific capabilities of the coordinating institution and the host country enabling the coordinator and other potential entities from that country to successfully apply for competitive funding in the European Union and globally;
  • Improved the R&I culture of the country hosting the co-ordinator (indicators such as research intensity, innovation performance, values towards R&I) through centers of excellence as lighthouses and role models;
  • Stimulus for institutional and systemic reforms and R&I investments at national level taking into account the enabling conditions on governance of smart specialization introduced under cohesion policy programmes as far as applicable;
  • Strengthened and mutually benefitting collaboration with partners from leading scientific institutions from abroad;
  • Development and promotion of new research strands in relevant domains;
  • Developed and enhanced research and innovation capacities and the uptake of advanced technologies;
  • Contribution to the achievement of the specific objectives of the supporting national/regional/EU programme as complementary funding;
  • Enhanced innovation and integration of planned processes, services and products of the center;
  • Enhanced co-operation and synergies with other European projects.

Eligibility Criteria

• Any legal entity, regardless of its place of establishment, including legal entities from non associated third countries or international organisations (including international European research organisations) is eligible to participate (whether it is eligible for funding or not), provided that the conditions laid down in the Horizon Europe Regulation have been met, along with any other conditions laid down in the specific call/topic.

For more information, visit European Commission.