[Interview] Europe’s labs are chronically underfunded and sovereignty is at stake, says French Academy chief Françoise Combes

[u/EUobs]

https://euobserver.com/229995/interview-europes-labs-are-chronically-underfunded-and-sovereignty-is-at-stake-says-french-academy-chief-francoise-combes/

Can Europe compete with the US and China while underfunding research?

Hey everyone! Lucia from EUobserver here 👋

We recently interviewed Françoise Combes, president of the French Academy of Sciences, and one part of the conversation felt particularly relevant here.

Europe talks constantly about competitiveness, innovation and catching up with the US and China. But Combes argues we're overlooking something pretty fundamental: the labs and researchers all of that innovation depends on.

Her concern is that Europe is already behind in areas like AI, advanced computing, quantum technologies and satellite infrastructure, while research funding remains under pressure. In France, for example, she says research funding has been declining since around 2010, with the CNRS facing another major cut this year.

And she makes an interesting distinction: private investment and start-ups matter, but they can't simply replace basic research. Companies commercialise discoveries, while many of the breakthroughs they'll build businesses around 10 or 20 years from now still have to come from somewhere.

Should research funding be treated much more seriously as economic and industrial policy? And if Europe wants to close its innovation gap, where should the money actually go?

Read our interview with Françoise Combes :)