European Defence Fund

European Defence Fund

The on-going war in Ukraine underpins the importance of improving European defence efforts. Recent experiences evidence the need to bolster defence potential on all levels.

As a follow up to the Article from May 2021 on the EDF, this article further informs us about the development of relevant European Defence policies and funding schemes. The calls for proposal stemming from the European Defence Fund launched almost a year ago (see image below) generated more than 140 proposals which are about to be evaluated and will result in significant co-funded projects by the end of this year.

Mid-February, the European Commission presented several initiatives on defence and security. The Defence package includes two Communications on a roadmap on critical technologies for security and defence, and on Commission contribution to European defence.

The roadmap on critical technologies builds on the Updated Industrial Strategy and the Action Plan on synergies between civil, defence and space industries and focuses on, amongst others, measures to boost European research and innovation cooperation, and to reduce strategic dependencies on critical technologies and value chains. 

The Communication on Commission contribution to European defence, proposes several measures towards a more competitive and harmonised European defence market, including stepping up investments for defence research and capabilities developed in EU cooperative frameworks, facilitating synergies between civilian and defence R&I, and incentivising the joint procurement of defence capabilities.

The main objective of the European Defence Fund (EDF) is to foster transborder cooperation in defence research and development in the EU. The aforementioned Defence package strives to complement the European Defence Fund by integrating all relevant phases from research and development to the complete industrial cycle and joint procurement of defence assets.

The EDF calls for 2022 are scheduled to be published before summer. The EUFUNDINGMAG will keep you informed in our upcoming editions.

For further details, please feel free to contact the EUFUNDINGHUB.