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Paris, March 7, 2007
François Goulard, the Minister Delegate for Higher Education and Research, François Loos, the Minister Delegate for Industry and Michel Cosnard, INRIA Chairman and CEO have signed an objectives and resources contract for the period 2006-2009. The new contract comes at a time when the field of information and communication science and technology – or ICST – continues to drive far-reaching changes in our societies at an ever increasing pace. The four-year contract will steer the Institute through this period in a spirit of mutual exchange with its supervising ministries.
ICST applications concern not only the fields of science and technology, but also have economic and social implications (e.g. engineering, production, services, defence and security), leading to the emergence of new markets. In particular, computer science and modelling will be critical to tomorrow's science and innovation.
In a world of ever growing international competition, government-funded research is vital to ICST. It reflects the ambition to work towards a knowledge-based economy. It helps to support and sustain useful links between basic research and more pressing technological development issues.
INRIA has clearly defined its activities with a view to growth and, for the period 2006-2009, will organise them around four central themes:
INRIA will continually update annual performance indicators and present a yearly report on scientific and technological breakthroughs with their associated transfer projects. For example, it undertakes to achieve a 50% increase in the number of times its publications are cited and to pursue an ambitious software development and distribution policy by taking a professional, systematic approach to its lab-to-marketplace activities.
As provided for by recent French legislation on research, INRIA will work to involve all its academic partners – in France and abroad – in its dynamic initiatives. Working hand in hand with its partners, the Institute will actively contribute to the creation and development of competitive clusters, especially those with international ambitions. It will amplify its training-through-research programme and emphasise communication aimed at young people and other non-specialists.
INRIA intends to maintain and develop collaborations with the best teams in the world and open its laboratories to young researchers from other countries. Outside Europe, INRIA will focus its cooperative actions on and North America.
In the area of human resources, INRIA will implement a growth-oriented policy by anticipating its requirements in terms of skills and career opportunities. It will encourage mobility and create a network of former collaborators. In addition, it will support initiatives which encourage women to pursue careers in research.
To enable INRIA to achieve these objectives, the contract stipulates that the French government will provide the resources necessary for reaching critical mass. Specifically, the government will support the new research units in Saclay, Bordeaux and Lille by providing for a significant increase in personnel.
The government will set itself the objective of increasing its subsidy to €165.7 million by 2009, an amount compatible with the plan already underway for a twofold increase in personnel.
Contract follow-up will be ensured through the submittal of a general annual report on the 39 actions set out in the contract plan. More especially, INRIA will continually update annual performance indicators and present a yearly report on scientific and technological breakthroughs with their associated transfer projects.
The French national institute for research in computer science and control is the only public institute entirely dedicated to research in information and communication science and technology (ICST). It has a 3,600 strong staff - 2,800 of which are scientists - distributed in six research units across France. INRIA has an annual budget of 160 million euros excluding VAT, 20% of which comes from its own research contracts and licences. INRIA has massive influence in the following fields: "networks, telecoms and multimedia", "complex systems and software" and "modelling, simulation and visualisation". It develops collaborations with the economic world through strategic industrial partners and by setting up open forums and creating companies (80 start-ups in 20 years) - particularly through its subsidiary INRIA-Transfert, promoter of four start-up funds
More information: http://www.inria.fr/index.en.html
| INRIA Vincent Coronini Tel.: + 33 1 39 63 57 29 |
François Goulard's staff: Christine Granier-Heurtevin Tel. +33 1 55 55 84 32 |
François Loos' staff: Hélène Philip Tel. +33 1 53 18 44 85 |
