EU-Wide Advantages & Opportunities for “Monitoring and Evaluation of the Societal Readiness Pilot” (HORIZON-CL5-2026-01-D2-09)

1. Single Market Access (450 + million people)

• Shared knowledge goods – The public web platform and annual workshops create an EU-wide repository of ‘do’s & don’ts’, instantly available to any Horizon Europe consortium in 27 Member States and all Associated Countries.

• Standardised SR methodology – A common Societal Readiness (SR) scoring/procedure lowers transaction costs for innovators when launching solutions simultaneously in multiple national markets.

2. Cross-Border Collaboration & Knowledge Exchange

• Mandatory interdisciplinarity galvanises cooperation between SSH & STEM actors across borders, filling historical gaps in many national R&I systems.

• Pan-European learning loops – 18 pilot projects from eight Cluster-5 topics become living laboratories whose results are synthesised and disseminated by the CSA, shortening the innovation learning curve for future projects in every Member State.

• Physical annual workshops (travel costs covered) remove financial barriers for smaller organisations from EU-13 / Widening countries to join high-level networks.

3. Alignment with EU Flagship Policies

• European Green Deal & Fit-for-55 – SR explicitly addresses social acceptance of climate-energy-mobility innovations, de-risking Green Deal roll-out.

• ERA Policy Agenda Action 11 (R&I for the Green Transition) – Creates evidence for responsible innovation frameworks requested by ERA.

• New European Innovation Agenda – Contributes to Flagship 3 (Tech Infrastructures) by offering a scalable SR infrastructure (web platform).

• Digital Europe & Data Governance Act – The open SR data sets/platform foster data spaces for social impact of technology.

4. Regulatory Harmonisation Benefits

• One EU standard for SR avoids fragmented national guidelines; regulators can reference a single EU-level procedure when assessing public-funded R&I.

• Facilitates mutual recognition of stakeholder-engagement processes (e.g., ethics, gender, inclusiveness) across Member States.

5. Access to Europe’s Innovation Ecosystem

• Direct interface with 18 top-tier Cluster-5 consortia (TRL 3-7) offers SMEs, NGOs and regional authorities early visibility of cutting-edge developments.

• Gateway to 3,000+ organisations in the wider Horizon Europe community via the platform, speeding up partner search and twinning.

6. Funding Synergies & Leverage Potential

• Cohesion Policy (ERDF/Interreg) – Regions can adopt the SR methodology created by this CSA in Smart Specialisation projects, unlocking additional co-funding.

• EIC Pathfinder/Transition – Teams moving from basic research to commercialisation can import SR tools to satisfy EIC societal impact criteria.

• LIFE & CEF Transport – SR evidence on public acceptance can strengthen environmental and mobility proposals under these programmes.

• National Recovery & Resilience Plans (RRF) – Member States investing in innovation governance can recycle the CSA’s outputs with minimal adaptation, ensuring EU-level consistency.

7. Scale & Impact

• EU-wide replicability – Lump-sum model and clear SR templates mean new calls can be launched rapidly in any Cluster or Mission.

• Cost-efficiency – A single 42-month CSA (€3-4 m indicative) replaces 27+ parallel national studies; Commission and Member States save millions.

• Social licence to operate – By embedding societal readiness early, technologies reach market faster and face fewer local opposition movements, boosting EU global competitiveness.

8. Strategic Value versus National-Level Initiatives

• Critical mass of data – Only an EU-wide action can pool a statistically significant sample (18 pilots × multiple sectors) to draw robust conclusions about SR effectiveness.

• Benchmarking diversity – Captures variations in cultural, legislative and socio-economic contexts impossible to reproduce in single-country schemes, resulting in a universally applicable methodology.

• Pan-European legitimacy – Recommendations endorsed by the Commission carry more weight with investors, regulators and civil society than domestic guidelines.

9. Actionable Opportunities for Applicants

1. Form a tripartite core: (a) SR/RRI think-tank; (b) data-analytics ICT SME (platform); (c) pan-EU network of SSH & STEM universities.

2. Secure Associated Country partners to widen geographical scope and score higher on excellence & impact.

3. Link with existing ERA hubs (e.g., Co-ARA pilot on Responsible Innovation) to maximise dissemination KPIs.

4. Design a modular SR toolkit ready for integration into Digital Europe common data spaces, positioning the consortium for follow-up service contracts.

5. Plan post-CSA exploitation: paid training packages for national ministries, ERA Chairs, EIT KICs, etc.

Bottom line: Operating at EU scale turns this CSA into the cornerstone for a single, harmonised Societal Readiness framework that accelerates climate-energy-mobility innovation, boosts market uptake, and offers durable commercial and policy-making opportunities far beyond what any national scheme could achieve.