The History of Euro-India SPIRIT
EuroIndia2004
The foundations of EuroIndia were laid through the first EU-promoted showcase IST
event, EuroIndia2004, organised in New Delhi which brought together more than 1,000
delegates over three days from the EU and India representing stakeholders in ICT
domains from key constituencies - industry, academia, research, government and civil
society-to deliberate on cooperation across a broad range of ICT thematics.
MONSOON
This success was consolidated through the EU funded FP6 Specific Support Action
project MONSOON [2005–2007] which has brought close to 2,000
EU and Indian players from academia, research, industry, government and NGOs into
a Community with the objective of enhancing mutual awareness, sharing competencies,
expertise and experience and defining priorities so as to develop collaborative
research and innovation activities, thereby increasing the presence of Indian organisations
in RTD project proposals under FP6 and FP7. Further support to increase the participation
of Indian organisations in FP6 EC funded projects was provided by the FP6 SSA INCITE
through training events organised in India.
MONSOON started with a thematic focus and evolved into a broader cooperation platform
to leverage the unveiling of FP7. The project seeded the Indian ICT ecosystem through
a nationwide approach focusing on regional centres of excellence in ICT education
and research in order to identify India’s ICT research strengths, institutions
and players. Through a series of four thematic workshops and seven comprehensive
Information Days and one-to-one consultation programmed in the second part of the
agenda, Monsoon succeeded in building up substantial awareness across a variety
of targeted academic and research institutions (the five premier Indian Institutes
of Technology/IITs and the Universities of Pune and Hyderabad) and brought them
up to date on the EU’s ICT research process, thematics, priorities, instruments
and funding options and showcased successful EU-India collaborative RTD projects
funded under the EU Framework Programmes. This effort was seen to be well thought
out and timely in the context of the build up towards Framework Programme 7 (FP7)
where India and EU are ideally poised to work together in a winwin format. Given
the prestige of the host institute and their cross links with external research
establishments and industry, the Monsoon Information Days drew a good mix of academia,
industry and research participants to the workshops.
Under the European Commission's 5th Framework Programme (FP5)
(1998-2002) Indian organisations were involved in IST proposals of which
0 were successful. 101 Indian Organisations were involved in the submission of Framework
Programme Six (FP6) (2002-2006) ICT proposals, of which 22 were successful while
41 Indian organisations were involved in the first two ICT calls of Framework Programme
Seven (FP7) (2007-2013) of which 7 were successful.
EuroIndia
Through 2007-2009, the EUROINDIA
project played a central role in creating awareness on the following key focus areas:
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Identify, exploit and sustain EU & Indian RTD potential through an exhaustive
mapping of the Indian ICT knowledge, research and innovation landscape
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Provide critical inputs to strengthen policy dialogue between the EU and India by
exploring common ground between the ICT programme in the EU’s 7th Framework
Programme and the Indian Information Society policy
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Reinforce the promotion of the EU ICT programme and increase Indian commitment and
participation
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Network a wide range of stakeholders through an institutional mechanism and a well-defined
agenda in order to evolve and support a vibrant EuroIndia ICT research community
EUROINDIA, owing to its highly qualified and strongly committed consortium of partners
and through the comprehensive knowledge mapping of the Indian ICT RTD landscape,
has been helping build a comprehensive understanding the Indian ICT research ecosystem,
ambitions and technological and societal priorities in order to succeed in a targeted
promotion of the EU ICT research agenda and bring in more Indian participation in
a sustained manner to undertake mutually-rewarding research projects by leveraging
complimentary expertise and strengths.
Euro-India SPIRIT
The ongoing Euro-India SPIRIT project, which includes four of the partners of the
present proposal among its six partner consortium, has the following key focus areas:
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Analyse the research dimension of Indian ICT policy, encompassing ICT technologies,
applications, user industry and domain implications
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Organise and probe stakeholders to identify medium to long term vision and perspectives
and reveal complementarities with EU priorities, notably the i2010 strategy and
objectives and updates
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Update, Assist and Enrich the Policy Dialogue process and meetings between the EU
and India with periodic reports, surveys and position papers encompassing findings
from policy research and stakeholder views dealing with common R&D perspectives,
priorities, opportunities and challenges
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Organise synchronized stakeholder events and domain experts deliberations to enhance
the profile and communicate the utility of the policy dialogue process
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Recommend future co-operation initiatives and identify matching counterpart funding
to leverage Indian research capability and capacity and to engage in projects in
common priority areas
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Develop synergies with activities underway in India covering Capacities, People
and INCO-NET dimensions