-
Share on
‘Weave’ Launches to Transform the Way Cross-border Research is Funded
Twelve Science Europe members launch Weave, a cross-European initiative to fund and support excellent international research projects. It is the first time that such a large number of funders develop an initiative to facilitate structured bilateral and trilateral scientific cooperation.
Weave aims to simplify the submission and selection procedures of collaborative research proposals involving researchers from up to three European countries or regions with a single evaluation. It makes use of existing national or regional funding programmes, through which research projects will be financed. It seeks to make it easier for researchers to collaborate across borders. It also ambitions to increase the capacity of researchers to freely determine the composition, focus, and content of their projects.
Weave builds on the Lead Agency Procedure, through which a single funding organisation evaluates proposals put forward by an international team of researchers and communicates the funding recommendation to the other funders involved. In practice, the researchers choose a coordinating applicant, who submits the joint proposal to the respective Weave funding organisation in their country or region.
Weave will be rolled out progressively over the course of the next years. Not all configurations for collaboration will be possible under Weave immediately at launch. Participating funders will start by funding projects with the other funders they have standing agreements with and will enlarged incrementally. Weave will also open up and welcome new funders into the scheme once fully up and running.
Weave has been supported by Science Europe over the course of the last three years. The Science Europe Office has assisted the task force, which is chaired by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) and has provided a forum for these exchanges. “We fully support the Weave initiative, and its effort to promote bilateral and trilateral scientific cooperation within Europe,” said Lidia Borrell-Damián, Science Europe Secretary General. “Innovative projects like Weave strongly contribute to strengthening international research collaboration and the realisation of the European Research Area.”
The Weave signatories have developed, with the support of Science Europe, an interactive online tool that researchers can use to determine the relevant funding opportunities for their projects. Visit the Weave website to discover more.
