EATRIS ERIC ERIC status awarded

Published 13 July 2016

Robert Jan Smits, Director General for Research and Innovation at the European Commission presenting the new ERIC status commemorative plaque to Wim Stalman (VUmc) and Giovanni Migliaccio (EATRIS).

The application to become an ERIC, or European Research Infrastructure Consortium, was successful and on Tuesday 12th November 2013 the European Commission approved the creation of a new European research infrastructure – EATRIS ERIC. An ERIC is a specific European legal form to facilitate cross-border research through the joint establishment and operation of research infrastructures of European interest. This new legal framework will provide a legal personality recognised in all Member States. The benefit to EATRIS stakeholders will be the establishment of a legal framework under which cross border collaboration can take place with the aim of expediting the sharing of expertise and the faster and more efficient development of new drugs and therapies.

Robert Jan Smits, Director General for Research and Innovation at the European Commission, visited EATRIS in Amsterdam to present the new status. Mr. Smits handed over a commemorative plaque to Frank de Man, Finance Director at EATRIS, in recognition of this new status, marking the inception of the first ERIC in the biomedical sciences domain.

The EATRIS ERIC is only the third European research program for which the European Commission has granted ERIC status – the other two are SHARE ERIC (Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe) and CLARIN ERIC (Common Language Resources and Technology Infrastructure).