New funding available with a change in ERC framework

Members will be pleased to learn that, following a request from EURO, the Association of European OR Societies, on behalf of operational research academics, the European Research Council (ERC) has added the term operational research to the current list of descriptors used on the mathematic panel.   

Starting from 2021 calls, the PE1_20 descriptor is renamed "Control, Optimisation and Operational Research."  

The first funding calls under the Work programme 2021 have been opened by the European Research Council and will continue to operate within the Excellent Science pillar of the Horizon Europe framework.  

Horizon Europe is the European Union flagship research and innovation framework and is the follow-on from Horizon 2020. The framework will run from 2021 to 2027, and as the UK is an associated country with the framework, UK institutions can participate.   

In a letter to EURO, ERC President Jean-Pierre Bourguignon said: "The Scientific Council is confident that this change will help the operational research community clearly finding a place in the programme and is looking forward to seeing an increase in the number of submissions in this area. The modified panel descriptors, including this change, are now available on the ERC website."  

The updated ERC call calendar for 2021 has been published on the ERC homepage, along with a video summarising key facts and novelties of the ERC calls under Work Programme 2021. You can find out more about this here: https://bit.ly/2QJcWOT