The main goal of RAISE is to contribute to the development of a new and sustainable integrated support framework to foster startup growth and scale-up within and across Europe in all its dimensions, from initial funding, research support to public incentives and internationalization. This will result in promoting competitive business models, unconventional collaborations and solutions from all, in all over Europe, and contributing to the establishment of a true EU startup ecosystem, not based on a single city or region, but linking all of them together. The vision of an interconnected EU startup ecosystem has been largely developed through the combined efforts of European associations, complementing the scope of the actions of national or regional agencies in the different countries, which offers a first opportunity for a more global perspective on the different aspects of startup support. However, and in spite of several cooperation initiatives between these organisations, there is still a lack of integration between their action plans, which creates gaps in startup support at EU level. This proposal will address these gaps establishing a joint agenda to build an effective collaboration amongst key players of the innovation ecosystem, fostering a common action that will inovolve key stakeholders at regional, national and EU level, that play a role in the lifecycle of start-ups growth be through upskilling initiatives, R&I programmes and policies, capacity building, private investment or access to public funding.

The overall aim of the H2Heat project is to demonstrate the full value chain for green hydrogen (H2) heating for commercial building heating. 40% of total energy consumed and 36% of greenhouse gas emissions in EU correspond to buildings, with 79% of that energy used for heating of water and air conditioning. H2HEAT, in exciting alliance with the Canary Health Service (SCS), wish to create a full demonstration of Green H2 for heating (and later energy). This will serve as the replicable model to be rolled out across the SCS hospitals enabling the SCS fulfil its ambitious ‘Health Zer0 net Emissions Strategy’ delivering deep decarbonization. H2HEAT will use offshore wind renewable energy (RE) to produce H2, from Esteyco 6MW EU funded WHEEL project. The centralised onshore H2 facility, will produce H2 initially with a 1MW electrolyser, to be used to substitute conventional fuel by the large end-user hospital CHUIMI with substantial heating requirements (>0.5MW), using a novel combination of an advanced combustion technology burner specifically designed for H2 operation H2-CHP, and a heat pump. The H2-CHP will produce heat and energy and the energy will power the heat pump for substantial heat provision to the hospital with no waste. Full end-to-end infrastructure for H2 transport and use will be planned, installed and commissioned. Comprehensive and complementary mixture of expertise and know-how provided by the consortium partners will ensure an efficient realization of the technical objectives of the project, reduce total cost of ownership (TCO) of H2 fuel for consumers, and develop replicable business models for wide-scale commercial usage of H2 as a direct heating alternative across Gran Canaria. H2Heat will contribute to enabling Gran Canaria become part of the H2 valley economy through locally produced H2 from RE.

GRRIP will embed sustainable RRI practices in 4 research performing organisations (RPO) and 1 dual function RPO and research funding organisation (RPO/RFO) (total 5 RPO&RFO) in the Marine and Maritime (M&M) sectors through Action Plans (AP) for institutional and cultural change. This will be accompanied by establishing a platform for engagement with the Quadruple Helix (QH) for each RPO&RFO, and a platform for mutual learning between the 5 RPO&RFOs and QHs. M&M is a high priority for the EU. However, the M&M is seriously exposed to the non RRI alignment between Research and Innovation (R&I), societal actors and the environment, affecting its performance and competitiveness. Objective 1: Co-develop, implement and evaluate self-tailored RRI APs to enable sustainable institutional and cultural change for the 5 M&M RPO&RFOs to embed RRI in their governance frameworks, structures and cultures. The APs will be based on a detailed audit of the RPO&RFO current RRI maturity level and the barriers identified. RRI dimensions will be incorporated into R&I. Objective 2: Establish structures to facilitate, promote and maximise real sustainable engagement with, and input from, the QH (industry, societal actors, policy and other RPO&RFOs). Objective 3: Establish indicators and methodology for impartial Monitoring, Reflection and Evaluation cycles, to ensure provision of evidence of societal, democratic, economic and scientific impacts of institutional changes. Objective 4: Develop a sustainable Mutual Learning process across the M&M RPO&RFOs both during the institutional and cultural change project and thereafter. Objective 5: Legacy: To enable more M&M RPO&RFOs to ground RRI practices through institutional and cultural changes by a) creating a practical user-friendly RRI AP framework template & guidelines, and b) launching a M&M RRI community. Objective 6: Examine how an RFO can positively influence and encourage an RPO towards RRI via its funding policy and interaction.

The Open and Universal Science (OPUS) project will develop coordination and support measures to reform the assessment of research and researchers at Research Performing Organisations (RPOs) and Research Funding Organisations (RFOs) towards a system that incentivises and rewards researchers to practise Open Science. We understand the term ‘Open Science’ to refer to practices providing open access to research outputs, early and open sharing of research, participation in open peer-review, measures to ensure reproducibility of results, involving all stakeholders in cocreation. We henceforth in this proposal employ this interpretation of Open Science with a specific focus on reforming the research(er) assessment system to incentivise and reward researchers to take up these practices. OPUS employs a three-tiered approach to ensure representation and consensus building of key stakeholder groups in the Open Science ecosystem: (1) our large project consortium consists of researcher organisations, RPOs, RFOs, industry organisations, and experts in project management, public relations, and Open Science (2) a series of stakeholder engagement sessions will be held with the broader community to gather input and validate key project deliverables (3) an Advisory Board of key representatives will ensure expert oversight and links to the community. • Objective 1: Conduct a comprehensive state-of-the-art on existing literature and initiatives for Open Science • Objective 2: Develop a comprehensive set of interventions to implement Open Science at RPOs and RFOs • Objective 3: Develop realistic indicators and metrics to monitor and drive Open Science at RPOs and RFOs • Objective 4: Test the interventions and indicators and metrics via action plans in pilots at RPOs and RFOs • Objective 5: Utilise a stakeholder-driven feed-back loop to develop, monitor, refine, and validate actions • Objective 6: Synthesise outcomes into policy briefs and a revised OS-CAM2 for research(er) assessment

The Sustainable Careers for Researcher Empowerment (SECURE) project will develop coordination and support measures to create, trial, implement, and mainstream a common Research Career Framework (RCF) that offers a suite of options to support organisations in the recruitment, employment, training, development, progression, and mobility of researchers with the aim of improving research careers and reducing career precarity. The RCF will recognise the research profession across sectors, provide a career development and progression structure for research careers, recognise both research and transferable skills and competences, facilitate intersectoral collaboration and mobility, and offer solutions to the precariousness of research careers in academia. SECURE will test aspects of the RCF and TTL models in trials in four RPOs, one RFO, and one recruitment agency . The trial organisations will first conduct a scoping exercise to map the RCF onto their existing policies and activities for research careers before developing integration plans on how the RCF could be adopted into their existing policies and activities. Due to the short duration of the project and window for trials, it is expected that only some aspects of the RCF and TTL models will be tested. The trial organisations will thus develop actions plans, selecting relevant aspects from the integration plans, to test and implement during the trials. SECURE will mainstream the RCF and TTL models through a series of policy briefs and a summit that explain key aspects of the RCF and TTL models to relevant organisations employing researchers. The RCF and TTL models will be further promoted through key partner organisations in the project targeting researchers, RPOs, and companies. The RCF and TTL models will lastly be promoted in the EURAXESS network including the many EURAXESS service centres, the newly established EURAXESS hubs, and through the ERA Talent Platform being developed.