They identify gaps and challenges, describe the desired paths towards
solutions, milestones to be reached at specified instants in time and with a
specified quality. They identify Innovation Milestones, and mobilise members
and non-members to realise them, and to support their subsequent
exploitation. All activities span the full spectrum from basic research, to
technological development, and concrete innovation, showing smooth paths of
knowledge transfer along the covered spectrum, and identifying concrete
actual and potential academia-industry cooperation. Topic Groups are the
instrument to provide content to the Strategic Research Agenda (SRA) and the
multiannual Roadmap (MAR) of euRobotics AISBL.
The priorities for R&D&I funding, including near market activities, are
derived from the MAR as a part of the annual review cycle. Robotics is a
diverse field and the MAR relies on expert opinion in each domain and
technical field to provide and verify the information within it. The annual
review process examines each key technical and market area to ensure
material is brought up to date at least once per annum. This document and
its associated Wiki provide a framework through which this additional
information can be accessed.
You, the reader, are encouraged to engage with this process and to
contribute your knowledge to the content of this document. It will then
reflect and sustain a live discourse on the current state of robotics
technology. You can do this by joining euRobotics and then contributing to
the Wiki and the associated Topic Groups. In order to join the Wiki as a
member of euRobotics AISBL, click here.
Recommendations to the Commission within the PPP consultation process
Robotics encompasses a broad spectrum of different technical disciplines and
impacts on a wide range of market domains in diverse ways. The scope of
R&D&I is driven by technology, the diversity of market sectors and the need
to maintain the innovation pipelines that connect the two together. Any
prioritisation of strategy must start by seeking to establish the linkage
between improvements in technical capability and market need. This linkage
and the corresponding technical requirements will be captured in the PPP
roadmap.
The scope of R&D&I is also framed by the European societal challenges that
can be addressed with robotics technology. Effective solutions will require
the cohesive integration of a wide range of expertise combined with changes
to societal and legal frameworks. The PPP has a role in ensuring that its
strategy aligns with these challenges and maximises the impact of robotics
technology as a potential solution. It is vital to Europe’s economic and
societal interests that these impacts are maximised through an appropriate
choice of R&D&I priorities. In setting priorities the PPP must take into
account this long view of market maturation as well as the shorter time
scale defined within Horizon 2020.
The MAR is the basis for developing in Partnership with the Commission
content, the selection of instruments (types of projects), and priorities
for Calls and actions in the field of robotics under H2020.