NCBR wants defence and dual-use research to shape Europe’s next framework programme

A coordinating role requires more than participation

NCBR’s National Contact Point director, Piotr Świerczyński, argued for involvement from the earliest stage of programme design and said the region does not fully use its Horizon Europe potential. The report presents that assessment without a participation ranking or a quantified regional funding gap.

For an industrial consortium, our interpretation is that a stronger role should be visible in responsibility for the research question, the integration plan and the use of results. Being listed among partners and being able to organise a coherent programme of work are different forms of participation. The latter requires administrative capacity as well as technical expertise.

The Commission proposal already contains a defence direction

In its July 2025 proposal, the Commission set out a €175 billion framework for 2028-2034, with four pillars. Its Competitiveness and Society pillar includes defence, industry and space in cooperation with the proposed European Competitiveness Fund. The Innovation pillar expands the European Innovation Council and introduces a focus on defence and dual-use start-ups.

These are features of the proposal described by the Commission. The €175 billion figure concerns the overall research framework, not a dedicated defence allocation. It must not be turned into a current grant pot or an entitlement for a particular country, company or Ukrainian partner.

Translate influence into an industrial research agenda

A useful contribution from a Polish consortium could identify a bottleneck shared by several potential users, the research needed to resolve it and the route from experimental evidence to a demonstrator. Our recommendation is to connect the scientific task to access rights, integration responsibility and a realistic plan for exploiting results.

That would make a coordinating role substantive. It would also help separate a research project’s shared European objective from each participant’s commercial interest. Questions about background intellectual property, test access and maintenance are easier to address before a consortium freezes its work plan.

NCBR’s intervention is therefore a signal to engage with programme formation. The eventual rules, budgets and work programmes will determine concrete opportunities. Firms should continue checking existing calls on their own terms rather than assuming that a future defence focus has already changed today’s eligibility conditions.