Ireland

The Innovation 2020 Strategy is being implemented by a whole-of-government approach through a multi-stakeholder Innovation 2020 Implementation Group. This new group replaces three existing groups – the Inter-Departmental Committee on STI, the Research Prioritisation Action Group and the High Level Group overseeing implementation of Ireland’s strategy to engage with Horizon 2020 – which have been merged to better streamline policy in the area. Technology Ireland continues to ensure maximum complementarity and coherence between the science and innovation programmes and initiatives of the enterprise agencies (EI, Industrial Development Authority [IDA] Ireland, and SFI) and the HEA. Under the aegis of the DJEI, it will continue to operate alongside the Innovation 2020 Implementation Group with a specific focus on enhancing synergies in initiatives to promote enterprise R&D. The remit of Technology Ireland is also being expanded to incorporate the role of the Industry Horizon 2020 Group to lead a cross agency approach to developing and delivering initiatives aimed at growing industry participation in Horizon 2020. At the same time, the Strategic Research Proposals Group, led by the Chief Scientific Adviser to the government (CSA), will continue to operate, with a focus on catalysing, developing and advising on successful submission of large-scale Horizon 2020 proposals, including proposals where Ireland can take a leading or major role. The Higher Education Research Group, which is led by the Department of Education and Skills, will continue to provide strategic direction for the approach of the higher education sector. Both of these groups will feed into discussions of the Innovation 2020 Implementation Group.<br /> Evaluation is becoming increasingly important with the substantial funding increases in RDI investments over the last decade. Evaluations of STI policies and programmes have been carried out principally at the request of the DJEI as a key investor in S&T and innovation. In 2014, the DJEI published evaluations of 12 major R&D supports provided by the enterprise agencies. The Department of Finance also evaluated the R&D tax credit in 2013. There is also an ongoing focus on monitoring Ireland’s participation in European Framework Programmes and its impacts, with an ex post evaluation of Ireland’s participation in FP7 and an ex ante evaluation of Horizon 2020 due for completion in 2016. In the context of Innovation 2020, Ireland has committed to review the full range of state financial aid for RDI, both direct and indirect.<br /> A governance issue that cuts across all research funders and providers in Ireland is that of research integrity. A National Policy Statement on Ensuring Research Integrity in Ireland was adopted in 2014, incorporating international best practices such as the European Code of Conduct for Research Integrity and the OECD Best Practices for Ensuring Scientific Integrity and Preventing Misconduct. SFI is currently piloting a series of Research Integrity audits, and consideration will be given to extending and expanding these audits nationally to include all Irish research performers and funders.

Irish universities and public research institutes file patents at a rate close to the OECD median (5p), while the proportion of public R&D expenditures financed by the private sector is among the lowest in the OECD (5o). Innovation 2020 sets out a policy framework and direction for knowledge transfer. A national knowledge transfer network has been built up. Enterprise Ireland funds the commercialisation of marketable scientific results and support for start up companies (among other things), while IDA looks after the requirements (including R&D) of multinational firms. Research can initially be funded by SFI and then can be funded subsequently by one of the other two agencies as Technology Readiness Levels rise. A central technology transfer office, known as Knowledge Transfer Ireland, was established in 2013. It maintains directories of experts based primarily in universities and also keeps track of patents and other intellectual property outcomes of research. The universities have recently upgraded their research and technology transfer offices in order to cope with the increased workload caused by the higher proportion of applied research now being undertaken.

A key goal of Enterprise 2025 is to design a new approach for a National Clustering Initiative in the key sectors of strength, building on the existing initiatives through competitive calls that seed cluster activities to stimulate more extensive clustering on a sustained basis, at a scale and depth that delivers to enterprise policy goals and has visibility and stature in an international context. The establishment of regional clusters also forms part of the implementation of the National Strategy for Higher Education to 2030. The purpose of developing these clusters is to foster greater collaboration in a region between institutions, both universities and institutes of technology, with a view to ensuring an accessible and quality engagement with the institutions, whether that is as a student, an enterprise or other.