Personalised medicine (PM) represents a paradigm shift away from a ‘one size fits all’ approach to the treatment and care of patients with a particular condition, to one which uses emergent approaches in particular technological areas such as diagnostic tests, functional genomic technologies, molecular pathways (etc.) to better manage patients’ health and to target therapies. Nowadays the challenge for national and regional authorities is to enable the shift from a REACTIVE healthcare system (based on episodic and acute care model) to a PREVENTIVE (stratifying at-risk individuals and ensure that preventive action is taken to intervene well before the onset of symptoms, let alone illness) and PREDICTIVE (leverage and integrate cutting-edge technologies to not only stratify risk, but even predict risk and intervene even further upstream) system – the so called Personalised Health (PH). In the face of this potential huge leap forward, the fact that personalised health lacks the cooperation and coordination needed to organise the still very fragmented field is a severe drawback to its development and to the placement of investments in an effective manner. For this reason, it is crucial to direct major efforts towards coordinating and aligning relevant stakeholders in personalised health action across Europe and beyond; create a participatory approach; build trust; enable a multi-stakeholder process; channel investments towards Personalised Health. All this considered, Regions4PerMed will coordinate regional policies and innovation programmes in Personalised Medicine and Personalised Health to accelerate the deployment of PH for citizens and patients. The project will reinforce the cooperation between H 2020 and ESIF on PH aspects; Strengthen industrial specialisation areas in Europe and allow PH to flourish as an Emerging Industry; Enable interregional joint investment on PH, including a stable link with Vanguard Initiative and with the European Innovation Council.

The ERA-Net “Cofund on BioTechnologies” (ERA CoBioTech) aims to better use synergies between current mechanisms of biotechnology research funding in Europe, to highlight the benefits of a bio-based economy for society, and to thus maintain and strengthen Europe’s global lead in modern biotechnology. The co-funded call will focus on application-oriented research in: a) Synthetic biology approaches to design and construct new biological parts, devices and systems b) Systems biology approaches to metabolic engineering and optimisation of biological processes c) Identification and use of the metabolic potentials of genomic data d) Chemical and biotechnological approaches to transform bio-based molecules into molecules with high added value. Bundling three predecessor ERA-Nets in the area of biotechnology, ERA CoBioTech significantly increases public funding (call volume ~ 30 Mio €), intensifies collaboration across relevant sectors and countries, and thus - advances RD&I in industrial biotechnology - establishes systems and synthetic biology as technology drivers in applied biotechnology, and - enhances the potential for exploitation through active industry involvement. Necessary steps and measures to achieve these goals will be encompassed in a joint Strategic Agenda. With a “European Biotechnology Hub”, ERA CoBioTech realises an entirely new concept, reaching out to key actors and stakeholders from multiple biotechnology-related areas in order to align different European strategic instruments with the goals of the KET biotechnology programme under Horizon 2020 and to increase public awareness of biotechnology for industrial uses. ERA CoBioTech will implement additional funding activities without EC co-funding, which will advance RD&I in industrial biotechnology in line with the Strategic Agenda and the outcomes of the "European Biotechnology Hub." ERA CoBioTech thus provides biotechnology stakeholders with tailor-made support regarding information, communication, networking and funding.

ERA PerMed will serve as a funding vehicle of topics identified in the Strategic Research and Innovation Agenda (SRIA) in Personalised Medicine and the Action Plan of ICPerMed. ERA PerMed will coordinate R&I efforts of the participating partners (funding agencies from EU, associate countries to H2020 and third countries). The main objective is planning, implementing, monitoring and disseminate up to four joint transnational calls (JTCs) tackling the value change in full to fund multidisciplinary transnational research projects covering each at least three slots of the value chain regarding Personalised Medicine. The ERA PerMed consortium is open to enlargement for the planned JTCs. According to funding scheme’s rules, ERA PerMed partners commit themselves to implement one call with top-up co-funding from the EC, and include funded project monitoring. Additionally, up to three non-cofunded calls will be carried, in order to broaden the scope of action of the efforts made by the EC and funding organizations to foster the Personalised Medicine Research Community and to be able to take into account recent changes within the landscape of personalised medicine, e.g. new developments of emerging technologies and societal challenges, which reinforces and amplifies the expected impact of ERA PerMed funding activity. Cooperation and links with ICPerMed and a dialogue with patient organisations, other European stakeholders and initiatives are crucial for both R&I and the implementation of their results and sustainability, which reinforces and amplifies the expected impact of ERA PerMed funding activity.