UNIVERSITY COLLEGE Dublin (UCD) and Trinity College Dublin (TCD) have secured a major share of a new €358 million fund for third-level research.
The programme – the single largest research investment in the history of the State – will be unveiled by Taoiseach Brian Cowen and Minister for Enterprise Batt O’Keeffe today.
Details of the funding, obtained by The Irish Times,highlight the success of the new UCD/Trinity Innovation Alliance.
TCD has secured more than €75 million in capital funding for Biomedical Sciences Development, while UCD has secured over €50 million to develop a new science centre.
While the Innovation Alliance has done well in the funding round, other universities will also be pleased by today's announcements. NUI Galway has secured €31.5 million for a project named Advancing Medicine Through Discovery. It will also gain €15.9 million for a new arts, humanities and social sciences research building.
UCC has secured €19 million for a project entitled Translating Bio Sciences into Health. It has also secured €7.5 million for a new environmental research institute.
Dublin City University (DCU) will receive over €16 million for a nano-bioanalytical research facility; NUI Maynooth will receive €4.6 million for ICT infrastructure development and UL will receivemore than €12 million for a national centre for applied materials research.
In all, the Government is committing €259 million in capital funding (directed at buildings) and €99 million in recurrent funding (directed at current and other costs) to the projects under Cycle 5 of the Programme for Research in Third-Level Institutions.
All projects require matching funds from non-exchequer sources. However, details of the precise breakdown between State and private funding is still unclear.
Earlier this year, the Government moved control of the 10-year-old third-level research programme from the Department of Education to the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Innovation.
The Government hopes the move will give a sharper commercial focus to research activity. Concern has been raised about the “failure” of the third-level research programme to generate new jobs despite securing €860m in funding since 1999.
In the past decade, over €800m has been invested in the third-level research programme, much of it funded by the Irish-American philanthropist Chuck Feeney. The current cycle is largely funded by the exchequer.All the projects secured funding after a rigorous assessment process by an international panel.
The UCD-TCD Innovation Alliance, which secured about 50 per cent of the total research programme funds, was established last year after discussions between the universities and senior figures in the Department of the Taoiseach. Mr Cowen has been a strong supporter of the alliance, which he says will give Ireland the critical mass it needs to build world-class research.
Education sources said the success of the alliance was to be expected given what one called “the outstanding record’’ of both colleges in research.
But the launch of the alliance – and the secret negotiations leading up to it – was bitterly resented by some other colleges.
Some institutions, including UCC, complained they were being relegated to a second tier, despite an excellent research record.
Today, Mr Cowen is expected to tell colleges that “everyone is a winner’’ under the new programme, which is the most ambitious research programme in the history of the State.
While UCD and TCD have performed exceptionally well, the other universities will also be pleased with the success of their projects in securing funding.
Earlier this year, the then minister for education Batt O’Keeffe moved to dispel concerns that millions of euro in funding could be “ringfenced” for the UCD/Trinity Innovation Alliance.
He stressed that the third-level programme was a competitive, independent process where each application for funding would be assessed on its own merits. “We’re certainly not going down the road of favouritism of two institutions.”
For UCD and TCD, the funding announced today will vindicate their decision to establish the alliance, as it has helped them to maximise funding.