The Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) will launch a specific call entitled “Promotion of Young Scientists in Eastern Europe” (PROMYS) to strengthen the research system of Eastern European EU member state countries by means of supporting the young scientists.

A comprehensive assessment of the European environment's state, trends and prospects, in a global context. The synthesis report informs future European environmental policy in general and its implementation between 2015 and 2020 in particular. It includes a reflection on the European environment in a global context, as well as chapters summarising the state of, trends in, and prospects for the environment in Europe.
Source: eea.europa.eu

Improving Europe's capacity to innovate and be globally competitive requires further efforts to encourage disruptive ideas and foster their commercial up-take. These are some of the conclusions to be drawn from the latest ranking of innovation performance across Europe.
Source: europa.eu

JRC is waiting for the application of experienced (at least 5 yrs.) researchers into its pool of applicants. The selection consists of an interview and an EPSO (European Personnel Selection Office) test. The EU Commission enters into a maximum 6 year contract with the successful applicants.

The European Commission has selected 94 SMEs from 19 countries to each receive a grant of up to €2.5 million (€5 million for health projects) to finance innovation activities and the development of their business plans. The companies will also be entitled to benefit from up to 12 days of business coaching.
Source: ec.europa.eu

293 SMEs from 30 countries have been selected in the latest round of under Phase 1 of the SME Instrument. For each project, the participants will receive €50,000 to finance feasibility studies. They can also request up to three days of business coaching. For this phase, the Commission received 2,363 proposals by the third cut-off date of Phase 1 on 17 December 2014. 320 received an evaluation score above the application threshold and 259 or 81% have been selected for funding.
Source: ec.europa.eu

The most supportive country in the region has been Hungary, which has taken steps to tackle the problem of bureaucracy stifling innovation. The clearest illustration of a desire for progress is its Runway Budapest 2.0.2.0 project. Under the initiative, the Hungarian government has pledged to roll out training programmes for entrepreneurs, ease their access to financing and reduce the complexity of tax procedures for start-ups, among other steps.
Source: hipa.hu

The most supportive country in the region has been Hungary, which has taken steps to tackle the problem of bureaucracy stifling innovation. The clearest illustration of a desire for progress is its Runway Budapest 2.0.2.0 project. Under the initiative, the Hungarian government has pledged to roll out training programmes for entrepreneurs, ease their access to financing and reduce the complexity of tax procedures for start-ups, among other steps.
Source: hipa.hu

The Lady Pitch Night is a competition for European female-founded startups, organized by Girls in Tech & Orange.

The signing of the accession agreement today confirms Israel’s status as a full partner in the plan, among the largest programs in the world for scientific and industrial cooperation. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso, this afternoon (Sunday, 8 June 2014), attended the signing ceremony on Israel’s accession to Horizon 2020 - the EU Framework Programme for Research and Innovation. EU Ambassador to Israel Lars Faaborg-Andersen and Science, Technology and Space Minister Yaakov Peri signed the accession agreement for the EU and Israel, respectively.
Source: breuerpress.com

One perfect pitch, and your ticket to Silicon Valley could be secured. But that and much more were at stake at the ‘Central European Startup Awards’, another milemarker along Budapest’s path to becoming a startup hub.
Budapest Business Journal, June 6, 2014.

On behalf of ITU Telecom World 2014, we are happy to announce the beginning of the Young Innovators Competition 2014. The annual competition offers young people the chance to win up to USD 10,000 in seed funding, take part in workshops on entrepreneurial skills, opportunities to meet and network with leading ICT players, and to showcase their projects at the InnovationSpace, a dedicated show floor pavilion at ITU Telecom World which will take place December 7-10 in Doha, Qatar.

TerraCycle is on a mission to reduce waste on our planet through upcycling and recycling pre- and post-consumer waste. Founded in 2001 by Tom Szaky, then a 20-year-old Princeton University freshman, TerraCycle, Inc. began producing organic fertilizer by packaging liquified “worm poop” in used soda bottles. Since the inauspicious start, TerraCycle has become one of the fastest-growing green companies in the world.
Source: meetup.com

The International Visegrad Fund—National Science Council, Taiwan Scholarship Program is a pro­gram oper­ated jointly by the Fund and the National Science Council (NSC), Taiwan. The aim of the pro­gram is to facil­i­tate aca­d­e­mic exchanges by pro­vid­ing sup­port to PhD can­di­dates and post­doc­toral researchers from the V4 coun­tries who intend to study or con­duct research in Taiwan. Reciprocal part of the pro­gram sup­port­ing mobil­ity of Taiwanese researchers to the V4 region is oper­ated by the NSC. V4 applicants—citizens of the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, or Slovakia—can apply to study or con­duct research at selected higher edu­ca­tion insti­tu­tions accred­ited by the gov­ern­ment of the Republic of China (Taiwan).
Source: visegradfund.org

Researchers of the MTA Wigner Research Centre for Physics have developed the "brain" of the robotic lander of the Rosetta spacecraft of the European Space Agency and they took part in designing and producing the space probe orbiter's plasma monitor, which includes five separate sensors. Furthermore, experts of the MTA Centre for Energy Research assumed an important role in developing a device each for two batches of instruments in the robotic lander.
Source: mta.hu

How to block the evolutionary adaptation of bacteria that makes them resistant to antibiotics, and how does the resulting resistance influence the bacteria's sensitivity to other medicaments? Those are the questions that MTA Momentum research unit at MTA Biological Research Centre in Szeged is seeking to answer, a team that has recently published a paper on the subject in the prestigious journal Molecular Systems Biology.
Source: mta.hu

The intelligent building inaugurated on Friday of MTA Research Centre for Natural Sciences will house five MTA research units in novel settings. With its 250 top level laboratories, 156 chemistry booths and a huge complex of community floor spaces, the facility will provide excellent conditions for practitioners in science, education and innovation in Hungary.
Source: mta.hu

Entrepreneurs behind new technologies will be spotlighted when the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) holds its 2013 EIT Awards in Budapest on 12 November. The latest developments in European innovation and entrepreneurship and their creators will be under consideration. Representatives of leading authorities in the field, including chairman of the EIT Governing Board Alexander von Gabain and World Innovation Institute founder Naveen Jain, will attend.
Source: budapesttimes.hu

A Nemzeti Innovációs Hivatal izraeli mintára szeretné támogatni a kezdő cégek, projektek pályára állítását az ehhez tőkét és szakmai segítséget nyújtó inkubátorok beindításával. Az Akkreditált Technológiai Inkubátor (ATI) keretében október 15-én hirdettek eredményt. A Figyelő c. újság a Gazella pályázat akkreditált cégeit mutatja be sorozatában. Másodikként a Digital Factory Zrt. mutatkozik be.

Rubik’s Cube, the household match, insulin, parachutes, and contact lenses. These are just some of the innovations that came from the countries of the former Communist Eastern Bloc of Europe. Hungary, the Czech Republic, Poland, Romania, Serbia, Croatia and Bulgaria are famous for their human capital and innovation. This has been the legacy of CEE, but the question young business people are asking is when is this latent potential going to flourish into the kind of tech startup boom well underway in Western Europe and the U.S.? Soooner than you think, if you ask the leaders of the entrepreneurial scene in the region.
Source: forbes.com