Instituto de Telecomunicações’ Post

💬 As part of Researchers’ Night 2025, the #REMAKING team at the Prague University of Economics and Business (VŠE) ran a workshop on migration in #Prague 📖 Using research from the project’s Enforced Migration Workers #casestudy, participants met two #newcomers to the city—a digital nomad and a person with temporary protection—through short videos based on real data. In small groups, they explored the #challenges each might face over time: on arrival, after three months, and after a year 💡 The #discussions highlighted both shared #struggles (uncertainty, bureaucracy, belonging) and different barriers shaped by #legal status. Many linked these insights to their own #experiences, leaving with greater empathy and understanding of #migration journeys in #Czechia 👏 The workshop was co-designed and led by Ivana Lukes Rybanska and Karolina Kania, PhD 🔗 On our website you will find the news and a photo gallery of the event: https://lnkd.in/dkRNZVBD #HorizonEU #workshop #ResearchersNight #Migration European Commission Alma Mater Studiorum – Università di Bologna CoLABOR Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv Elhuyar Trinity College Dublin Prague University of Economics and Business European Creative Hubs Network European Research Executive Agency (REA) Visionary Analytics Paris School of Business R-Map project EU WinWin4WorkLife Marko Orel Faculty of Business Administration, VŠE

✨ Thrilled to share a new publication in Regional Studies with Fu Wenying and Daniel Schiller: “Structural and agentic powers in university-based regional innovation across Chinese core and non-core cities” 📑 Universities are increasingly pivotal in driving place-based innovation. In China, the rise of university-based National Research and Development Institutes (NRDIs) provides a unique lens to examine how local governments and universities collaborate to shape regional innovation pathways. Based on six university-based NRDIs, our study explores how structural and agentic powers interact in shaping those collaborations across core and non-core cities. We hope our findings will enrich academic debates on structure–agency dynamics and inform policies that drive university-based regional innovation. 🔎 We identify three patterns of structural-agentic power interplay: 1. Strong–strong reinforcement: mutually enabling collaboration 2. Weak–weak constraints: limited innovation outcomes 3. Misaligned relations: tensions that hinder progress 💡 Key insight: University-based NRDIs can act as top-down platforms to integrate innovation resources in core cities, and as experimental testbeds enabling new development paths in non-core cities. This dual role highlights their potential for reducing regional disparities and strengthening decentralised innovation governance. 👉 Read the paper here: https://lnkd.in/dxDDW5pH We’d love to hear your thoughts on how universities can drive regional innovation in different urban contexts! #RegionalInnovation #UniversityIndustryCollaboration #China #RegionalDevelopment #InnovationGovernance #HigherEducation #InnovationIntermediaries #RegionalStudies

🤝 Amid international concerns over the China Scholarship Council, our latest blog's authors qianqian xie & Alfredo Yegros look at the data. They reveal trends, collaborations and broader implications, and ultimately argue for a "balanced, evidence-based approach". 👇 Read it now on Leiden Madtrics https://lnkd.in/ew534Jqk

I’m excited to share our latest blog “Balancing opportunity and risk: rethinking the China Scholarship Council Programmes (CSC) amid geopolitical tensions” 🥳 🥳 , co-written with Alfredo Yegros and building on our recent paper. In the post, we explore how CSC international mobility grant programmes both open doors and present challenges, especially in today’s climate of heightened geopolitical tensions. What we found: ✨ • CSC-funded researchers contribute to high-impact research and foster strong international collaborations ✨ • They often help fill funding gaps in under-resourced areas within host countries. ✨ • However, their engagement in security-sensitive research remains limited. Our analysis draws on analysis about what research is produced, how influential it is, who collaborates with whom, the funding environments involved, and whether research overlaps with sensitive areas. In the end, we propose policy recommendations calling for a balanced, evidence-based approach for host countries. One that safeguards security without closing the door to collaboration. Trust, transparency and open dialogue might be what keep global science moving forward. Read the full post on Leiden Madtrics https://lnkd.in/ew534Jqk #ResearchFunding #SciencePolicy #InternationalMobility #ChinaScholarshipCouncil

💣 A Funding System Under Pressure: Horizon Europe’s Application Explosion ‼️ The numbers just released by the European Research Executive Agency (REA) are striking. More than 3,400 proposals have been submitted to just five Horizon Europe calls, with some actions showing an 80% increase in one year. 📈 The 2025 call for Culture, Creativity and Inclusive Society alone attracted 1,331 applications, setting a record for the social sciences and humanities. The ERA Fellowships call reached 1,758 proposals, an 85% rise compared to 2024. Other calls, such as Research Infrastructures and Reforming and Enhancing the R&I system, followed the same trend. This explosion of applications is not an isolated episode. As I discussed in my recent article on Erasmus+ (https://lnkd.in/eE-2rbME), EU funding programmes are experiencing an unprecedented surge in demand, fundamentally reshaping how they work. 📉 The implications are profound. The higher the number of applications, the lower the success rates, and the more unequal the playing field becomes. For applicants, this means months of work and growing uncertainty. For the European Commission, its Directorates-General and Executive Agencies, it means confronting the challenge of redesigning evaluation systems that are reaching their limits. If this trend continues, the next Multiannual Financial Framework will need to rethink not only budgets but also accessibility, fairness and sustainability across all programmes. Otherwise, we risk a situation where brilliant ideas and solid partnerships will keep competing in an arena with vanishing chances of success. This is not a criticism, but an invitation to reflection. The explosion in proposals is also a sign of vitality, of organisations that believe in Europe’s programmes. But it is time to ask how we can channel this energy more effectively, to ensure that Europe’s funding remains both ambitious and accessible. Read the statistics below: https://lnkd.in/eUCeyfU7 #HorizonEurope #EUFunds #Research EURAXESS EASSH – European Alliance for Social Sciences and Humanities EARTO - European Association of Research and Technology Organisations EUF - European University Foundation European University Association League of European Research Universities (LERU) Manuel Segovia-Martinez Tally Hatzakis Alicia Gómez Campos Panagiotis Kokkinakos Sutra

This story is becoming increasingly uneasy. The numbers say it all, but the reality they reveal is even harder to digest. We simply cannot continue like this. The current “apply everywhere” logic has become toxic, inefficient, and deeply unfair. Calls showing an 80% increase in applications in one year are a red flag. With the majority of calls now facing success rates below 5%, we are crossing the line between competitiveness and absurdity. It’s becoming inexcusable for organisations to apply under every possible call just to stay visible or relevant. What are we doing? Flooding systems, exhausting evaluators, burning out teams, and in the process, undermining the credibility of our own field. And what is the Commission doing with this overwhelming surge? They see it. They know the pressure on their evaluation systems, and the reality that good proposals, strong partnerships, and months of work are now more likely to be discarded than assessed. This is not about blame; it’s about #responsibility, a key message I have personally highlighted in our PM AGORA some days ago. If Europe wants quality, innovation, and long-term value, then both sides — applicants and institutions — need to rethink the model. Because when excellence has less than a 5% chance to be heard, the system is no longer working. It’s time to pause, reflect, and redesign, before we lose the very ecosystem we have spent decades building. European Commission Roberto Zanon Alessandro Carbone Andreas Stefanidis Leonardo Lorusso

I've worked in and with universities throughout my professional life. They are fascinating organisations, simultaneously ancient and cutting-edge. Our oldest universities, like ninth-century Al-Qarawiyyin University, have been around longer than most nation states. This Nature special edition does a great job of setting out the breadth of pressures they face today: funding models under strain, research budgets squeezed, political attacks on their independence, visa restrictions undermining international mobility, peer review systems breaking down, and mental health crises among overloaded academics. For me, there's a key threat that Nature's analysis only addresses in passing: how much cutting edge R&D now happens in corporate labs, funded at levels university researchers can only dream of. The UK government's record £20 billion ($25.5bn) R&D budget for 2024/25 sounds impressive, until you realise Google alone spends £39.5 billion ($50bn) and Microsoft £23.2 billion ($29bn) annually on R&D. Individual tech companies are outspending entire national research programmes, fundamentally shifting where breakthrough discoveries emerge. Are universities destined to become teaching-focused institutions while breakthrough research migrates to tech companies? And what happens to research in areas that don't interest big tech or pharma - fundamental science, humanities, social sciences, or research addressing challenges in developing countries? Universities exist to pursue knowledge for its own sake and tackle problems that are crucial for society's long-term wellbeing. It is in all our interests that they remain central to the global research endeavour. https://lnkd.in/efHBmT2F #HigherEducation #Universities #ResearchPolicy #Innovation #FutureOfEducation

Sharing this post because it raises a point that feels especially relevant here in the UK. Even with the cuts and pressures in the US, their research spending still operates on a scale we can only dream of. Google on its own spends more on R&D than the UK government does nationally. Microsoft isn’t far behind. That’s troubling for the British research ecosystem. Universities here are already under strain—shrinking budgets, political pressures, international barriers—yet they’re expected to keep pace with a global research landscape where individual corporations outspend entire nations. The risk is clear: without sustained investment, UK universities could slide into being teaching-focused institutions while the frontier of discovery shifts to US tech companies. And that leaves vital areas—fundamental science, social sciences, humanities, and research for global challenges—underfunded and overlooked. We should be asking: how do we ensure UK universities remain not just historic institutions, but future-shaping engines of discovery?

Our Managing Director Rob Johnson's analysis of the shifting university R&D landscape attracted significant attention last week. When individual tech companies like Google (£39.5bn) and Microsoft (£23.2bn) outspend the UK government's entire £20bn R&D budget, what happens to research that doesn't interest big tech - fundamental science, humanities, research addressing developing world challenges? Read Rob's full analysis below. #ResearchStrategy #HigherEducation #ResearchPolicy