An analysis of the role and impact of industry participation in framework programmes

The study analyses industry participation in FP6 and FP7, based on an extensive literature review, the analysis of CORDA data corroborated by a counterfactual evaluation, interviews with participants, case studies and feedback from an expert workshop. The results show that industry participation has increased with respect to previous programmes, for both large companies and SMEs, with a particular concentration on high-tech sectors. The key factors for participation, as well as the reasons behind the different levels in different themes, appear to be more related to the strategic alignment of the programme and companies’ priorities, than to operational issues such as administrative burden, success rates and participation costs. The study then presents the impact of FP on innovation, in terms of direct, indirect and behavioural additionality, and the related barriers, mainly related to the lack of flexibility during the project implementation. In terms of job creation, based on a counterfactual impact evaluation the results show that FP helped to create on average 2 new jobs per each company. Finally, conclusions and policy recommendations are presented, taking into account the innovations introduced by H2020