On 3 March Carlos Moedas, Commissioner for Research, Science and Innovation at European Commission gave a speech at the David Attenborough Building, University of Cambridge on ‘Reinventing European research for the information age’. Carlos Moedas was joined by Jo Johnson MP, the UK Minister for Science and Universities, and the event was chaired by Professor Dame Athene Donald. Moedas emphasised the need for Europe to be the best place in the world for excellent science and innovation and wanted openness to be the cornerstone of Horizon2020. He added that science is now a global endeavour that needs a global outlook to succeed and stated that his priorities were open innovation, open science and to be open to the world.
He continued that the UK is good at attracting international talent and since 2014 over 300 European Research Council grants have gone to researchers in the UK. Over 100 of these have gone to Cambridge University alone- more than any other university.
After the lecture Moedas participated in a roundtable discussion chaired by Professor Sir Richard Friend, Director of the Maxwell Centre, which aims to promote industry-academia collaboration in the physical sciences and technology, and members of the Energy@Cambridge strategic research initiative.
The purpose of the roundtable was to both inform Moedas of energy related research capability at Cambridge and to help shape the European Commission’s thinking and provide useful input into the EC cabinet’s EU energy research strategy. Moedas outlined the need for a European Innovation Council and to support disruptive innovation and industries of the future.