15.01.2010
Baden-Württemberg top beneficiary of EU research funding
The high quality of universities, research institutions and companies in Baden-Württemberg puts them top of the league when it comes to EU funding grants for research. The evaluation of the sixth European Framework Programme for Research for the period 2002 to 2006 shows that five of the ten most successful universities in Germany are located in the southwest. The University of Stuttgart leads the way after acquiring 54 million euros of funding for its research institutes alone. A total of 672 million euros found their way to the southwest of Germany - one fifth of total funding granted to Germany as a whole. In fact, the state government in Stuttgart has just announced that Baden-Württemberg has already garnered 22 per cent of the total funds destined for Germany under the seventh European Framework Programme for Research. A sure sign of the continuing success of scholars and researchers in Baden-Württemberg.
Alongside the universities in southwest Germany, companies have also attracted an above-average share of EU funding. With Daimler AG, SAP AG, Robert Bosch GmbH and Alcatel SEL, four of Germany's ten best companies are from Baden-Württemberg.
The EU disbursed a total of 17.5 billion euros for research purposes in the period 2002 to 2006. Over 53 billion euros have been budgeted for the current seventh European Framework Programme for Research. Baden-Württemberg intends to continue providing financial and administrative assistance to ensure that promising research projects in the region continue to receive support from EU programmes. As an example, the state government pointed to the most recent success of the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) which beat all other comers in the competition run by the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) with its "InnoEnergy" research project. Under the lead management of the KIT the research project on renewable energies will receive between 25 and 30 million euros from the EU over the next four years. 35 European partners from the worlds of business and science are involved in the project.
