Ireland invests €460m in new industry-focused research centres

Ireland is investing €460 million (£397 million) into seven new research centres dedicated to fields such as artificial intelligence and healthcare but academics remain concerned about the government’s wider plans for research funding.

Research Ireland, the government’s research and innovation agency, said in a statement that the new centres would also focus on areas such as quantum technology and energy.

They will operate under a new network known as Rinn - the Irish world for point, tip or headland – over the next eight years and are expected to attract a €500 million from industry and international partners.

The agency said the centres would support 577 research positions, develop “over 800 PhDs” and involve 17 research-performing organisations, including several universities. 

“The scale and scope of this €460 million investment is a powerful statement of Ireland’s ambition in research and innovation. Research Ireland centres have, over the last 13 years, fundamentally reshaped our innovation landscape – turning excellent and innovative research into real-world societal and economic impact,” said James Lawless, Ireland’s higher education minister.

The announcement comes at a time of growing concern among Irish researchers about the overall future direction of research funding in Ireland.  

More than 2,000 academics and researchers have signed an open letter criticising parts of Research Ireland’s wider research and innovation plan, known as the 2026-30 strategy.

The strategy will guide how €4.55 billion is distributed over the next five years.

In the letter, academics criticise the focus on “commercially translatable research and economic impact” over discovery research and work dedicated to the public.

“The disproportionate focus on industry interests instead of discovery research and the public interest marginalises the Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences (AHSS) and the fundamental sciences, and minimises research for social good and research that is truly innovative and ground-breaking,” the letter reads.

It also hits out at proposed changes to how PhD students and postdoctoral researchers are funded.

Scholarships are awarded centrally by the Irish Research Council but under the new strategy, they will instead be awarded to universities to distribute. Signatories argue that the move “undermines the notion of funding excellence in ideas and people regardless of discipline or institution by concentrating awards into institutional priorities”.

Earlier this week, Research Ireland acknowledged the letter and defended their wider strategy.

“The letter expresses concern that all research may be required to demonstrate economic utility to receive funding. The strategy does not introduce such a requirement. Investigator-led programmes will be assessed based on research excellence, supported by rigorous peer review,” the agency says in its statement.

It added that there would be no reduction in funding for PhD researchers and discovery research. Funding would “continue to be allocated based on excellence and peer review, with oversight provided by Research Ireland”.

The agency listed a series of actions it was taking to “strengthen engagement” with the arts, humanities, and social sciences (AHSS) community, including establishing an advisory council, a roundtable of deans within AHSS disciplines and the appointment of an “AHSS expert” to guide the implementation of research across the agency’s programmes.  

seher.asaf@timeshighereducation.com