e-infrastructures

The overarching aim of the e-infrastructure activities in Horizon 2020 is to achieve by 2020 a single and open European space for on-line research where researchers enjoy leading-edge, ubiquitous and reliable services for networking and computing, and seamless and open access to e-Science environments and global data resources.

To achieve this goal, support will be given to:

• global research and education networks providing advanced, standardised and scalable inter-domain services on-demand
• data, grid and cloud infrastructures providing access to any type of data as well as virtually unlimited data processing and preservation capacity
• an ecosystem of supercomputing facilities, advancing towards exascale
• a software and service infrastructure, achieving excellence in strategic application domains and HPC take-up by SMEs, e.g. for simulation and visualisation, and
• a globally interoperable, open and trusted infrastructure for scientific information.

The activities above related to the ecosystem of supercomputing facilities and to the achievement of excellence in HPC applications are part of the European HPC strategy.

The major changes in Horizon 2020 with regard to the previous framework programme (FP7) include the emphasis on innovation and the development of human resources, addressing industry as an e-infrastructure supplier and user, more resolve towards service orientation and service integration, and more emphasis on data infrastructure development.

In Horizon 2020 the e-infrastructure activities are part of the 'European Research Infrastructures, including e-infrastructures' programme. The indicative budget for e-infrastructures from 2014 to 2020 is 890 million euros.