Questionnaire

Questionnaire

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Questionnaire

Introduction

The European Commission has appointed a group of experts with diverse professional experience to assess the maturity of the research infrastructures on the ESFRI roadmap. The group is composed of reputed professionals in the field of research, listed hereafter in alphabetic order: Professor Alfonso Franciosi (University of Trieste and CEO Elettra-Sincrotrone Trieste), Professor Sine Larsen (University of Copenhagen), Dr. John Marks (former Deputy CEO ESF), Dr. Karl Tichmann (former Managing Director IPP), Professor Milena Zic Fuchs (University of Zagreb) and Professor Richard Wade (former Chief Operating Officer, STFC). Dr. Antonella Calvia-Goetz, an expert on Research Infrastructures appraisal at the European Investment Bank, chairs the group.

Contact points for the European Commission: Dr. Elena Righi-Steele (Programme Officer) and Dr. Paul Tuinder (Legal Officer).

Legal notice:

All experts act on a personal basis. The work of the Assessment Expert Group does not engage in any way any of their institutions (including the European Investment Bank).

The views expressed and reproductions used in this document should not be considered as constituting the official position of the European Commission.

Dear Project Coordinator,

The European Commission has tasked the Assessment Expert Group with reviewing the maturity of the projects included in the ESFRI Roadmap. Its goal is to assess the current project status and the likelihood of each project entering the implementation phase by 2015.

To this end, the Assessment Expert Group needs updated written information and where possible documentation about each project (see reference list of additional documents in section 7 below).

To assess the maturity of the projects the Expert Group will examine the following general areas: Costs and Financial Commitment, Governance, Scientific and Legal Management, Human Resource Policy and Project Management, R&D and Innovation Policy and Engagement with Stakeholders, User Strategy, Feasibility and Risk.

We kindly ask you to reply to the best of your ability to the enclosed questionnaire (sections 1 to 6) and to provide whenever possible existing accompanying documentation (section 7). If you think that a specific question does not apply to your facility, please indicate this explicitly and indicate why not. Please provide also an updated short summary description of your research infrastructure, as per Table 1.

Your replies will form the basis for the assessment of your project by the experts. If further clarifications are needed, interviews will be organised between January and March 2013.

Kindly send the answers to the enclosed questionnaire at the email address indicated in the accompanying email by December 15, 2012 together with any relevant and already available written documentation about your project. Please base your answers on currently existing documentation, since the current assessment exercise is focused on the progress achieved until now.

Yours

The Assessment Expert Group

List of questions:

For distributed research infrastructures consider only the Coordinating/Central Entity.

ELIXIR is a truly distributed Research Infrastructure - Nodes will all carry out pan-European activities and services. To examine the Hub in isolation would be to misrepresent the infrastructure as a whole. This report therefore provides information on both the ELIXIR Hub and Nodes.

1. Costs and Financial Commitments

· Describe the top level cost structure including construction and operations. If there are decommissioning costs, have these been identified?

· Provide current cost estimates and budget projections (with currently available breakdown). Please indicate the confidence levels of your estimates. Please indicate if they are based on suppliers’ quotations.

ELIXIR represents more than a major upgrade to Europe’s bioinformatics resources. It builds on services provided by leading and emerging bioinformatics providers currently operating within Europe, but adds value by integrating data and services and developing complementary activities for life science researchers. The scope of the pan-European coordination of bioinformatics services represents a step change.

ELIXIR will be constructed as a pan-European distributed infrastructure with a central coordinating Hub at EMBL-EBI based on the site of the Wellcome Trust Genome Campus in Hinxton, Cambridge, and a series of Nodes distributed throughout the participating Member States. It is envisaged that the Nodes will keep their pre-existing legal identities and they will conclude collaboration agreements with the ELIXIR Hub. Both the central Hub and the Nodes require financing. The diagram below shows the funding model which has been developed for ELIXIR.

The Hub is funded through ELIXIR Member States. In 2013, at the point at which the ELIXIR Consortium Agreement is signed, a five year operating budget for the Hub will come into effect, funded by participating Member States. The ELIXIR Nodes are funded by the national funding agencies in the country in which they are based. Some ELIXIR Nodes may look towards accessing EU Structural Funds to assist with the construction and operation of their activities. The ELIXIR Hub and Nodes will together seek additional funding from alternative sources such as Horizon 2020 and, if deemed appropriate, through contracts with industry under a model that is being developed.

Figures provided for the ESFRI 2010 Roadmap indicated that the construction costs of ELIXIR – referring both to the Hub and the Nodes - would be €470 million, with annual operating costs of €100 million per year. Estimating the total final cost of ELIXIR is difficult as ELIXIR Nodes will all vary in size, scope and staffing levels. Furthermore, as more countries join ELIXIR, including from outside Europe, the overall size, shape and therefore cost of the infrastructure will increase too.

The draft ESFRI Implementation Report, which is currently under preparation by the ESFRI Implementation Group, acknowledges the difficulties that exist for distributed infrastructures in being able to accurately estimate the total construction and operating costs. Given the challenge of securing financial Member State investment in this current economic climate it is likely that ELIXIR will have to start more slowly than originally planned until the economic situation improves and there will inevitably be some downward revision of the original costs foreseen in the 2010 roadmap.

There are no decommissioning costs associated with ELIXIR.

Further information:

ELIXIR Business Case is available at: http://www.elixir-europe.org/sites/elixir-europe.org/files/documents/businesscase_2011_high_res.pdf

The ELIXIR Financial Strategy from the Preparatory Phase is available at: http://www.elixir-europe.org/prep/sites/elixir-europe.org.prep/files/documents/reports/wp5_elixir_funding_strategy_final_report.doc

· Describe the current level of financial commitment to the project. Please provide relevant supporting documents.

Construction and Operation of ELIXIR Nodes

Several countries have already made firm investments for the development and operation of national ELIXIR Nodes. These investments represent new money set aside by the following Member States specifically for the purpose of constructing ELIXIR Nodes: Estonia (€0.42 million); Denmark (€5 million); Sweden (€1.7 million), Finland (€14 million for a joint ELIXIR + BBMRI + EATRIS Node); Norway (€6.5 million); and Spain (€1.7 million p. a. over 3 years). This investment totals close to €30 million and has been awarded as new funding specifically dedicated to supporting ELIXIR activities in those countries.

In addition, many of the Nodes and EMBL-EBI have considerable on-going commitments to promote infrastructure service activities. For example, EMBL-EBI’s budget totals over €40 million/annum for running costs. Similarly, SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics provides infrastructure services and is supported by the Swiss Government to around €14 million/annum. All such services funded at national level or through EMBL will be designated as ELIXIR affiliated services.

ELIXIR Member States have all now submitted applications to host Nodes. The applications having been prepared by the institute that will be allocated the status of an ELIXIR Node. These will be reviewed by the ELIXIR Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) in December 2012. Part of the application process required Nodes to set out the expected operating costs of the country’s respective Node for the period 2013 – 2015, and by virtue of being put to the ELIXIR Board by Member State representatives, contain with an endorsement that the funding is available in each of these countries for the activities described.

Table 1 below summarises the combined projected operating costs of the current ELIXIR Member States for the period 2013 - 2015. Even on the basis of no additional country joining, which is highly unlikely, the total operating costs of the Nodes exceeds €30 million, €36 million and €38 million respectively over each of the coming three years. The total funding for Nodes from current Member States over this three year period is €105 million. In addition, EMBL-EBI, which is funded by EMBL Member States, will provide “ELIXIR affiliated services”. The operating costs of EMBL-EBI over this period are €43 million, €46 million and €48 million respectively, totalling over €138 million. Table 2 describes the staff deployment at ELIXIR Nodes over the same period as indicated in their Node Applications.

Table 1: Projected operating costs of ELIXIR Nodes

Table 2: Projected staff deployment on ELIXIR Nodes

Construction of ELIXIR Hub

The construction of the ELIXIR Hub is being funded by the UK, which will become the host country of the ELIXIR Hub. Through the Large Facilities Capital Fund (LFCF) the UK made two major financial contributions. In early 2011, it contributed an initial £12 million (€14 million) towards the construction of the ELIXIR Hub. In December 2011, the UK committed a further £75 million (€ 92 million) to enable a new building, which is currently being constructed on the Wellcome Trust Genome Campus. This building will house the staff working for the ELIXIR Hub. Construction began in June 2012 and the building will be ready for occupancy in autumn 2013.

Additionally, a major portion of this investment has been used to purchase considerable off-site compute and data storage capacity at the London Data Centre. The combined investment from the UK is over €100 million. It is expected that the full construction costs of the ELIXIR Hub have now been met through this award. Grant letters to EMBL-EBI from the LFCF can be supplied upon request.

Operation of ELIXIR Hub

The Interim ELIXIR Board has agreed that in the current interim phase, before the ELIXIR Consortium Agreement is signed, operating budgets for the Hub will be approved and implemented on an annual basis. Once the ELIXIR Consortium Agreement is signed then a full five-year budget will come into effect. The process for developing this budget will take place in tandem with the ongoing development of the ELIXIR Consortium Agreement.

ELIXIR Member States have approved an interim operating budget for the ELIXIR Hub for 2012 of €557,500 and for 2013 of €1,370,000. Much of the 2012 budget has already been committed. It is supporting five Pilot Projects to act as test beds for the coordination and integration of the Nodes. This work began on 1 October 2012. The recruitment of the ELIXIR Founding Director is also underway and the 2012 budget will cover the costs of this recruitment. The job specification for the ELIXIR Founding Director is available in Annex for information.

The budget for 2013 was approved at the Interim ELIXIR Board meeting in October 2012 and this will allow for the further continuation of the technical work to integrate the Hub and Nodes. This budget covers the salary costs of the ELIXIR Director, a small secretariat to support him/her, and a technical team to begin the work of integrating services. A diagram showing the Hub organigram for 2013 is available in section 3.

Further information:

ELIXIR Node Applications could be supplied upon request following approval from each Member State.

Construction of Technical Hub building: http://www.elixir-europe.org/news/ground-breaking-ceremony-elixir-hub-building

Strategy for UK Life Sciences, which references the commitment to ELIXIR: http://www.bis.gov.uk/assets/biscore/innovation/docs/s/11-1429-strategy-for-uk-life-sciences

2. Governance, scientific and legal management

· What is the chosen legal structure? Please enclose statutes and related documents.

According to the draft ELIXIR Consortium Agreement, ELIXIR will be subject to an Agreement to be concluded by countries and EMBL. In this agreement the members will agree to use EMBL’s legal personality to carry out activities and to use EMBL’s existing administrative facilities. Contributions by the Member States will partly be used to recompense EMBL. Moving to an ERIC will be considered in future should this be deemed appropriate by Members. During the Preparatory Phase of ELIXIR, partners carried out a thorough exercise to assess the various legal models available including the ERIC, a limited liability company and the current model, i.e. a Consortium Agreement linked to an existing organisation. The preparatory phase partners agreed that this legal model comes with many advantages most notably profiting from an existing organisation and thereby allowing for a speedy implementation. In order to progress towards signing the ELIXIR Consortium Agreement, a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) has been sent to interested countries. This MoU governs ELIXIR in its interim phase before the final ELIXIR International Consortium Agreement is signed. Fourteen countries and EMBL have signed the ELIXIR MoU so far.

The Interim ELIXIR Board has established an International Consortium Agreement Working Group, with support provided by the ELIXIR Legal Expert, comprising a mixture of both scientific and administrative ELIXIR Board Members. Independent legal advice is sought on an ad-hoc basis from an international law firm.

In October 2012 the Working Group presented a first draft ELIXIR Consortium Agreement to the Interim ELIXIR Board, which has now been shared with legal experts in the Member States, for their input and revision. It is envisaged that the final International Consortium Agreement will be approved by the Interim ELIXIR Board in April 2013. The exact date of the formal signature of the ELIXIR Consortium Agreement will vary between countries but hopefully will be done in 2013. It will come into force upon the signature by five countries and EMBL.

Further information:

Draft International Consortium Agreement to be attached as Annex 1

FAQ on International Consortium Agreement to be attached

ELIXIR MoU to be attached as Annex 2

ELIXIR Preparatory Phase report on Legal aspects is available at: http://www.elixir-europe.org/prep/sites/elixir-europe.org.prep/files/documents/reports/elixir_wp4_roadmap_report_final.pdf

· Please explain how the roles of the Chair, Director, Boards, etc. are defined to ensure good governance and control. Please provide an organisation chart relating to governance.

The MoU governs ELIXIR during this interim phase and includes details of the governance structure and the relationship between the ELIXIR Interim Board, the ELIXIR Directorate and ELIXIR Member States. The ELIXIR MoU is attached as Annex 2 to this report. In addition, the diagram below shows the agreed relationship between the various ELIXIR bodies in the draft ECA. We can envisage a transition stage of several months at the beginning of the construction process, where some countries have signed the ELIXIR Collaboration Agreement and others are awaiting the approval from their respective national body before being able to sign.

Table 3: Governance Structure

The ELIXIR SAB has already been appointed and meets on 14 December for its first review meeting. Members of the ELIXIR SAB are listed here: http://www.elixir-europe.org/about/elixirs-leadership

In addition an ELIXIR Nodes committee will be established. Permanent and ad-hoc Working Groups, reporting to the ELIXIR Board, will be established as appropriate.

· What, in your view, is the added value of performing the research activities foreseen within a research infrastructure instead of performing it as a research programme in consortia, cooperation etc.?

The future for biological research discovery lies in the integration of heterogeneous data and modelling of complex systems. This is a very active area of research and one which needs improved data integration. As the flood of data increases this will simply not be possible without a coordinated data infrastructure.

Organisations involved in providing bioinformatics services at present will shortly not be able to handle the data deluge such is the increasing rate and complexity of new data being generated. The task is simply too great for any one organisation or country to handle alone. If Europe is to cement its place as a leader in bioinformatics, its Member States need to act together through ELIXIR.

Table 4: Current rate of data generation

The Hub and Nodes structure of ELIXIR allows Europe to respond to this challenge collectively. However, in order for users to be able to navigate through many different types of data, which is potentially held at different locations, the integration of services needs to take place. It is imperative that ELIXIR is constructed as a tightly connected infrastructure, rather than a loose network of partners. By working together closely, ELIXIR Member States, and Europe, derive the benefit of reducing the fragmentation that currently exists within the bioinformatics landscape.

3. HR Policy and Project Management

· Describe plans or established procedures for project managers’ selection, staff hiring, and independent project evaluation.

As ELIXIR is a distributed Research Infrastructure, staff working for ELIXIR will be employed on the contract of the institution where their work is located.

Staff employed at the ELIXIR Hub will be employed under EMBL contracts, following the staff rules and policies of EMBL. Staff in the Nodes will be contracted to the employing body within their Node. This is in line with the proposed staffing policy of other distributed Research Infrastructures. Employing bodies will follow their normal recruitment procedure to recruit staff, using a transparent and open process, in adherence of national and European legislation.

· Describe parameters to gauge project success (Key Performance Indicators), planned project work breakdown structure (WBS) and related responsibilities, major item procurement schedule, coordination methods within the project and among the partners and timeline with milestones. Provide the conceptual design report (CDR), if applicable.

The overall ELIXIR-wide coordination method is described under the Governance section earlier. In addition, each Node is responsible for the construction and operation of its own ELIXIR-related services. As such, Nodes will follow the policies for procurement that are set by their hosting organisation. It is difficult to set ELIXIR-wide Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) at this stage as ELIXIR Node Applications are still under consideration by the ELIXIR SAB. Once the SAB review process has been completed, ELIXIR Nodes will have the opportunity in early 2013 to take onboard comments from the SAB and revise the scope of proposed ELIXIR services accordingly. In April 2013, the ELIXIR Interim Board will make a final recommendation on each ELIXIR Node and following this, the ELIXIR Director will work with each Node to develop a Collaboration Agreement with the Hub. These Collaboration Agreements will set out the exact services each Node will provide. Relevant KPIs can be developed out of these Collaboration Agreements.

The major procurement item for ELIXIR has been the construction of the building that will house the Hub and the purchase of compute and data storage facilities in the London Data Centre. These have been funded through the UK’s Large Facilities Capital Fund (LFCF). Overall responsibility for managing this investment lies with Mark Green, Head of Administration of EMBL-EBI, supported by Mary Barlow, Programme Project Manager, EMBL-EBI. The detailed ‘Project Objectives and Critical Success Factors’ report, which lists in detail the Key Performance Indicators, is attached in the accompanying email.

· Describe the internal project organization and reporting structure.

The ELIXIR Hub will be staffed through the Hub operating budget. Funding for the posts below has been approved through the 2013 Interim Hub budget. Staffing at the Hub will increase over time, depending on the scale of Member State financial contribution and the scope of activities being proposed by ELIXIR Nodes.

The first appointment will be that of the ELIXIR Founding Director and the recruitment process for this post is currently underway. A search committee, comprising several Members of the Interim ELIXIR Board, has led on this appointment. Once in post, the ELIXIR Director will lead on the recruitment of the other posts in the Hub and will work with the ELIXIR Interim Board to develop plans for the recruitment of additional technical staff for the coming years.

Table 5: Preliminary organisation chart for ELIXIR Hub in 2013

4. R&D policy and engagement with stakeholders

· Who are your stakeholders (e.g. government ministries, research funding organisations, EC, private sector and public bodies, scientific community)?

· What is the nature of their commitment, including any in-kind contributions?

· In what form (documents) is the commitment expressed?

The ELIXIR Preparatory Phase allowed partners to define the various stakeholders of ELIXIR. A summary of this is available through the Prep Phase report below.

The main stakeholder of any Research Infrastructure is its user community, and more information on ELIXIR’s extensive user community is presented in section 5 below.

The European Commission is a stakeholder in ELIXIR in two ways. As a funder of collaborative R&D through FP7, the Innovative Medicines Initiative and, in future, Horizon 2020, large amounts of data will be generated. ELIXIR will be the infrastructure that can store, annotate and add value to, and make available these data to others. Secondly, researchers working on EU-funded grants will also need to access ELIXIR services to be able to carry out their research in the life sciences.

The other 12 ESFRI Research Infrastructures in the biological and medical sciences are also stakeholders in ELIXIR. ELIXIR will play an underpinning role in supporting all of these Research Infrastructures by being able to store data generated on these infrastructures if required, and by hosting important reference data. The importance of ELIXIR to the ESFRI biological and medical sciences Research Infrastructures has been acknowledged through the funding by the European Commission of the €10 million BioMedBridges project, which builds the technical bridges to allow the data generated on ESFRI infrastructures to be stored within ELIXIR.

Industry is a major stakeholder in ELIXIR. Few commercial organisations are equipped to deal with the challenges posed by the data deluge using their own internal resources. This is true of both large industry and SMEs. Companies are faced with static or shrinking information systems budgets and manpower and many are re-evaluating the need for pre-competitive IP generated internally. The infrastructure being established by ELIXIR is seen as an answer to this problem. Further information on ELIXIR’s current engagement with industry is described in section 5.

The e-Infrastructure community is another key stakeholder group for ELIXIR. ELIXIR is building links with the main e-Infrastructures such as GEANT and the DANTE delivery authority, the European Grid Infrastructure (EGI), EUDAT and PRACE. These e-Infrastructures are involved in the BioMedBridges cluster project, which is coordinated by ELIXIR.

As ELIXIR brings together bioinformatics providers and national ministries and funding bodies, both of these groups are ELIXIR stakeholders. ELIXIR is on the national Roadmap of the following countries: Estonia, Norway, Slovenia, Spain, Switzerland, the UK.

Major commitments have been made by both of these in terms of finances and signing the MoU. The financial commitments received from ELIXIR stakeholders have been detailed under section ‘1 Costs and Financial Commitments’. The political commitments made by ELIXIR countries in signing the ELIXIR MoU are listed in section ‘2 Governance, scientific and legal management’.

The ELIXIR Preparatory Phase report on communities: http://www.elixir-europe.org/prep/sites/elixir-europe.org.prep/files/documents/reports/d3.4_user_communities_report.pdf

5.User strategy

· Describe the size and composition of the expected user community, including the relative distribution between users from academia, research institutions and commercial entities. Please describe the envisioned access policy to the infrastructure for the different groups of the user community. Please address any ethical issue connected with user access.

There are approximately 3 million life sciences researchers in Europe. ELIXIR’s user community includes researchers working in all aspects of life sciences including bioinformatics, biology, medicine, nutrition, agriculture and the environment. Users will be based in academia, clinics, large industry and SMEs. Furthermore, usage of ELIXIR resources will be international and not exclusive to Europe alone.

EMBL-EBI alone receives over 7 million web hits a day and more than 1 million unique users per year. ELIXIR will integrate these services with the leading services provided by participating Member States to provide a single integrated interface for users. The total usage of ELIXIR will therefore be significantly higher than this, and it is perhaps likely to have the highest usage of all ESFRI Research Infrastructures.

ELIXIR users include academia (universities and research institutes) and industry. All ELIXIR partners have good links to industry and industrial organisations are represented as partners on several ELIXIR Nodes.

The user survey conducted as part of the ELIXIR preparatory phase (WP3.5) helped ELIXIR identify general, as well as specific needs and priorities of individual user groups.

Further information:

The ELIXIR Preparatory Phase User Survey is available at: http://www.elixir-europe.org/prep/sites/elixir-europe.org.prep/files/documents/reports/elixir_usersurvey_finalreport.pdf

· Describe the data access policy and any implication it may have for Intellectual Property Rights.

Data and knowledge provided by ELIXIR will be freely accessible with some controlled access, where necessary. Charging for data, or seeking to restrict access through exercising Intellectual Property (IP) rights, would seriously impede the ability of research and industrial organisations to exploit data and return benefits. It is therefore vital to maintain open access to biological data. This view is strongly supported by industry, which appreciates the pre-competitive value of accessing key data free of charge.

There are exceptions to the open access policy, such as data derived from individual humans which can rarely be completely open access for reasons of personal security and privacy, and commercially sensitive data held by industry. Therefore controlled access policies will need to be developed for some data. In this respect BioMedBridges, which is a joint effort between ELIXIR and all of the ESFRI Bio Medical Sciences Research Infrastructures, will play a leading role in developing relevant policies.

BioMedBridges will develop the shared e-infrastructure - the technical bridges - to allow interoperability between data and services in the biological, medical, translational and clinical domains and thus strengthen biomedical resources in Europe. To achieve this in a way that covers all applicable ethical considerations, the project has developed an ethics framework, which includes monitoring by an ethics committee comprising external experts and an ethics management report to the European Commission. The Ethical Framework for BioMedBridges has now been approved and this will be followed by ELIXIR.

Further Information:

BioMedBridges project website: www.biomedbridges.eu

The Ethical Framework Guidelines are attached as Annex 3.

· Describe in detail the “pricing” policy for international user access, relations with industry, commercial exploitation of IP and/or services available.

As described above, the general principle of ELIXIR is open access and the infrastructure is therefore no ‘pricing policy’. For some services, such as services relating to industry, ELIXIR may consider developing models where bespoke services are offered, at a charge, to certain users. Further information on the proposals for engaging industry is detailed below.

· Describe the procedure for appointment of international review and advisory panels that will regulate access by non-commercial users and the industrial liaison organization that will regulate access by commercial users, if applicable.

Industry currently represents approximately 20% of public usage of data resources (based on EMBL-EBI statistics), and will continue to have open access to all the data where appropriate. Industry has participated in the ELIXIR Preparatory Phase, and the findings of the Industry stakeholders committee are included in the WP3bcc report and discussions are on-going.

Industry sees added value in ELIXIR in terms of reduced costs and duplication of effort for them, higher scalability, access to common data and interface standards and much better public–private data integration. Their key requirements from ELIXIR are a service-oriented delivery organisation, unrestricted resource distribution, agreed levels of service, secure access to protect IP and common standards.

There are several possible models of cooperation that have been identified, which would allow for close collaboration with industry including some cost sharing. These interactions should involve not only large companies in the life science sector (including pharmaceutical, consumer goods, healthcare, agriculture and biotechnology companies) but also SMEs. Some of the industry-specific services ELIXIR will consider developing include:

· Industry-sponsored customised training

· Industry-sponsored customised development of data resources or tools

· Pre-competitive projects

· Industry-sponsored development of relevant standards

· Private industry servers deployed in and supported by the ELIXIR Data Centre

· Industrial provision of cloud-based server access to copies of public data.

The Interim ELIXIR Board will develop a strategy for engagement with industry over the coming year. The first step in the process is a workshop for the Heads of ELIXIR Nodes in Amsterdam in March 2013, where engagement with industry will be on the agenda for discussion.

In addition, industry is a partner in many of the ELIXIR Node Applications that have been submitted and so, in this sense, industry is more than a user. Industry will be actively engaged as partners in the deployment of ELIXIR services.

ELIXIR will seek advice and input from its Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) as to its services, including how fit for purpose these are for users.

6.Feasibility and Risks

· Are there scientific developments elsewhere that could affect the research foreseen at the infrastructure?

Global links are essential and so it is imperative that ELIXIR keeps up to date with the latest advancements in technological development. Although achieving this is not seen as a major challenge for ELIXIR, as it will be for some other ESFRI Research Infrastructures, There does, however, remain a risk associated with other competitor initiatives from the US and Asia in that Europe could be ‘outcompeted’ if rapid action and implementation of ELIXIR does not take place.

· Please give us a list of risks that in your view could delay, increase costs of or make realisation of the infrastructure tasks impossible. Have you undertaken a technical options analysis?

Constructing a technical infrastructure across a multitude of European countries is not without some risk. However, the technical solutions to integrating ELIXIR services are all viable and ELIXIR partners have the required expertise and experience to be able to construct and operate the infrastructure. In addition, the BioMedBridges cluster project, coordinated by EMBL (as coordinator of ELIXIR), has already begun to help construct some of the technical bridges that will allow ELIXIR to communicate data generated through the other ESFRI BMS Research Infrastructures.

Each Node builds on the local infrastructure hosted by its own institution and so each has its own local risk analysis. Whilst not a technical challenge, the nature of ELIXIR, which is built upon Nodes that are funded nationally yet providing international services, means that Member States will have to examine carefully the services they make available and the perceived return they derive from these investments.

At EMBL-EBI, as part of the review process in accessing the capital funding from the UK’s Large Facilities Capital Fund, a thorough risk assessment exercise took place, including considering the relative risk to the storage of data at the London Data Centre of the threat of natural and man-made disasters. The option that was chosen was considered to have minimal risk.

The construction of the Hub building is progressing on schedule. Even if this were delayed ELIXIR Hub staff would be accommodated in existing offices within EMBL-EBI until the point at which the building was open. Given that the staffing of the ELIXIR Hub is relatively modest in the early years, this poses no risk.

· What are the main schedule uncertainties? Do you have any specific technical risks?

The main schedule uncertainties relate to:

· Slippage in signing the ELIXIR Consortium Agreement – although the ELIXIR Interim Board is confident of being able to sign the ELIXIR Consortium Agreement in 2013, experience observing other Research Infrastructures indicates that there is always a possibility of delay

· Appointing the ELIXIR Director – The ELIXIR Founding Director is a key post and ELIXIR has recentlyadvertising this post. It is hoped that a Director will be appointed in early 2013, although as with any appointment, some uncertainty exists as to the month at which the appointee could start.

· The exact timing of new countries joining – The process and timeline by which Member States produce and update their national roadmaps varies from one country to another. In addition, even when an ESFRI Research Infrastructure is on a national roadmap, the process for that country joining the Research Infrastructure can take time. This can make it difficult for the central planning and coordination of ELIXIR as new services need to be integrated and the budget adjusted accordingly with the addition countries.

7Additional Documents

· Final infrastructure proposal, including, if available, Feasibility Study, Investment Review and Legal Statute.

Organisational and schedule charts.

· Next steps and the 5 most important milestones until construction / operation start, including the milestones to be reached by mid-2015.

· Completion of the first five ELIXIR Pilot Projects (completion expected 31 December 2012)

· Appointment of ELIXIR Founding Director (appointment foreseen for early 2013)

· Review of the ELIXIR Node Applications, which were submitted in autumn 2013 (review process has begun and will continue with ELIXIR Interim Board making final recommendation at April 2013 Interim Board meeting)

· Signature of the ELIXIR International Consortium Agreement (foreseen for 2013)

· Negotiation and signature of Collaboration Agreements (to be concluded upon agreement of ELIXIR International Consortium Agreement)

· The 5 most important problems to be solved before start of construction / operation.

· Agreement of a suitable five year budget for ELIXIR Consortium Agreement, which is acceptable and feasible for Member States and at the same time allows for the undertaking of the necessary technical work.

·

· The 5 most important milestones in the first two years after construction / operation start.

·

· Development and signature of Collaboration Agreements between ELIXIR and each Node and linked to this the rolling out of first ELIXIR services operated by the Nodes

· Long-term (five year) agreement on the budget for the ELIXIR Hub

· Development of a formalised plan for interactions with industry

· Establishing the ELIXIR Directorate

· Development of a plan for cyber infrastructure (cloud)

Table 1: Summary of Research Infrastructure.

Name of the Project: ELIXIR

 Description: Europe’s Life Sciences Infrastructure for Biological Information

Please add a picture (if available)

Year of introduction in ESFRI Roadmap

Expected Year for Implementation

Expected Year for Starting Operation

2006

2012

2012

Legal Structure

Scientific Goals

Expected Socio-Economic Benefits

Type of Infrastructure

International Consortium Agreement between countries and EMBL based on which EMBL will provide the legal entity and offer some of its services to ELIXIR.

ELIXIR will radically enhance Europe’s data infrastructure and make it more accessible. That means presenting users with a single, transparent interface to a world of resources. It also means fully integrating the growing variety of data so that we can make the most of our expanding informatics capacity.

Research projects today look at biological problems from many perspectives, using several different technologies. It should be simple for large, distributed groups to draw on a number of powerful data resources to answer complex questions, and to move from one to the other seamlessly.

But there are hundreds of biological databases in Europe, ranging from major core datasets – such as the vertebrate genomes in Ensembl – to very small specialist collections overseen on a part-time basis by individual researchers.

This is confusing to the majority of potential users.

An effective data infrastructure will encompass all of these resources, and tie them in rationally to the tools used to access and interpret the data they contain. Importantly, it will be sustainably funded so that the data do not disappear.

Every day, scientists and doctors are finding out more about genes, proteins and the complex networks at play in living things. This information provides valuable insights into how we and other life forms grow and change, and how diseases progress.

It can help us understand a patient’s family history better, and discover substances that can be used to make new medicines to treat disease. It can also inform the way we plant crops, or how we might use them differently.

The results of these experiments – the data – are a goldmine for life scientists, both in academia and in industry. They are not only essential for research, but are in themselves the bedrock for game-changing developments in:

· healthcare

· food production and security

· environmental protection

· energy

· and a host of other industries that innovate on the infinite potential of life.

In terms of stimulating industry and innovation, ELIXIR will be a key foundation in the European life sciences innovation chain. Approximately 20% of EMBL-EBI usage comes from industry, and this equates to over a 1 million users a day. ELIXIR will build on this, providing an industry standard infrastructure that will enable SMEs and multinationals, from pharma through to food and agri companies, can make new discoveries and develop new products.

Distributed Research Infrastructure which is at the same time an e-Infrastructure

Host Country/Key co-ordinator

Partner Countries

Key Stakeholders

Key Users

Prep Phase coordinated by EMBL

Hub located in UK

As of November 2012

Czech RepublicDenmarkEstoniaFinlandIsraelItalyNetherlandsNorwayPortugalSlovenia Sweden Spain SwitzerlandUK

Plus EMBL

Funding bodies, ministries, charities, industry, academia

Life scientist researchers all over the world. There are estimated to be 3 million life science researchers alone in Europe, and the role that bioinformatics plays in research means that a huge number of these will be ELIXIR users.

Estimated Project Investment Cost (years)[footnoteRef:1] [1: Please indicate your key assumptions in a footnote or in an Annex.]

Annual Project Operational Cost[footnoteRef:2] [2: Ditto as 2.]

Overall Annual Contribution[footnoteRef:3] [3: Ditto as 2.]

Overall In-Kind Contributions[footnoteRef:4] [4: Ditto as 2.]

€470 million for total construction costs

€100 million per year for operating costs

The contributions received so far relate to the construction of the Hub, the operating costs of Nodes and the operating costs of the Hub. Detailed information is provided on these in section 1

All contributions received so far have been cash contributions. In kind contributions have not been included.

ANNEX

Agreed and Approved 2012 ELIXIR Hub Budget

Income

2012

Member State Contributions

 

Ordinary Contributions

€ 557,523

Total Income

€ 557,523

 

 

Expenditure

 

Technological Activities

 

Elixir Pilot Projects

€ 93,433

 

 

Directorate and Administrative Costs

 

Salaries

€ 20,139

Running Costs

€ 47,694

Equipment

€ 1,878

Overheads

€ 54,268

Total Directorate and Administrative Expenditure

€ 123,978

Total Expenditure

€ 217,412

 

 

Surplus/(Deficit)

€ 340,112

General Reserve

Opening Balance

€ 0

Movement in Year

€ 340,112

Transfer to Depreciation Reserve

€ 0

Closing Balance

€ 340,112

Depreciation Reserve

Opening Balance

€ 0

Transfer from General Reserve

€ 0

Closing Balance

€ 0

Agreed and approved 2013 ELIXIR Hub Budget

Income

2013

Member State Contributions

 

Ordinary Contributions

€ 1,369,993

Total Income

€ 1,369,993

 

 

Expenditure

 

Technological Activities

 

Elixir Pilot Projects

 

Salaries

€ 415,563

Running Costs

€ 123,928

Equipment

€ 20,029

Total Technological Costs

€ 559,520

 

 

Directorate and Administrative Costs

 

Salaries

€ 330,302

Running Costs

€ 119,422

Equipment

€ 20,780

Overheads

€ 339,969

Total Directorate and Administrative Expenditure

€ 810,473

 

 

Total Expenditure

€ 1,369,993

 

 

Surplus/(Deficit)

€ 0

General Reserve

Opening Balance

€ 433,545

Movement in Year

€ 0

Transfer to Depreciation Reserve

€ 0

Closing Balance

€ 433,545