To counter these trends, a variety of programs to 

 attract students to S&T careers, and to motivate 

 post-docs and young professionals to remain in Europe, 

 are at the top of Community priorities, for both the 

 Commission and the Member States individually. 

 Efforts by the EC, in pilot mobility and exchange 

 programs like COMETT .uid ERASMUS, are being 

 designed and implemented to remove barriers to and 

 coalesce national efforts in pursu. of this goal. Any 

 notable success here will certainly be reflected in some 

 reduction of European students who s'-iy, and scientists 

 and engineers who teach and work, in the United States. 



Complicating the situation is the rapid growth, in both 

 the U.S. and the EC, in recruitment of academic and 

 public sector researchers to perform research for the 

 private sector, with the resulting diminishment in the 

 ratio of researchers to projects taking place in the open 

 environment of fundamental research. At the same time, 

 the flow of information pertaining to ongoing research 

 and results is becoming somewhat restricted in those 

 fields with identifiable commercial potential 

 (microelectronics, biotechnology, advanced materials, 

 chemical engineering, etc.). This has noticeably 

 discernible effects on U.S. -EC cooperation at the level 

 of such programs as JESSI and SEMATECH; it is also 

 exerting less obvious effects on discussions about future 

 fields of U.S. -EC cooperation where commercial 

 benefits may emerge. 



A resulting diminution in the levels and frequency of 

 international contacts would exacerbate the problem of 

 familiarizing American researchers and S&E students 

 with European S&T activity and traditions. An 

 exception may develop with U.S. professionals and 

 students recruited to work in Europe. However, the 

 numbers of U.S. expatriates are likely to be quite small, 

 as the majority of U.S. S&T students and young 

 professionals — like their counterparts in other 

 fields — have relatively little professional experience of 

 or ties to Europe. 



U.S. Access to European Research Programs 

 and Results 



Concern: Increased emphasis in the EC on applied 

 technologies research for intemational 

 competitiveness, combined with the 

 restrictions on non-EC participation in 

 multinational R&D programs, may have a 

 deleterious effect on U.S. access to European 

 research projects and their results. The present 



uncertainty over the locus of authority in the 

 EC for IPR issues, along with the absense of 

 U.S. agreement with individual member states 

 on IPR protections, further hinders US-EC 

 cooperation. 



Issues: In what ways should, and can, the U.S. 



government intervene on behalf of the U.S. 

 research community to secure equivalent 

 access to publicly-funded research in Europe? 

 Given the relationship of intellectual property 

 rights (IPR) to access, what is the nature of 

 NSF interests in IPR discussions with the 

 Europeans? Should IPR negotiations be 

 conducted primarily through the EC or 

 directly with each member state government? 

 How can the U.S. and the EC work to create 

 the widest possible access to information on 

 research projects and results consistent with 

 the objective of openness in public research 

 funding? 



Assessment: Present Situation Regarding U.S. Access 

 to EC Research and the Role of 

 Intellectual Property Rights 



Access to participation in ongoing publicly-funded 

 research, as well as to research results, is an area of 

 concern. Despite repeated assurances from European 

 officials, the organization and participatory criteria of 

 several of the largest multilateral European research 

 programs have created doubts about the transparency 

 and openness of future S&T activities receiving EC 

 support. 



This concern has been particularly visible in the field 

 of microelectronics R&D, where the bulk of both EC 

 and EUREKA funding have been concentrated. 

 Conditions for participation by U.S. subsidiaries in 

 Europe that meet the "integrated presence" requirement 

 seem to have eased recently with the IBM-Siemens joint 

 research agreement, a virtual entree for IBM into the 

 JESSI program. However, relatively few American 

 firms can afford, or wish to divert, substantial fixed 

 R&D resources and investment to Europe. The great 

 majority of U.S. R&D-performing companies seem 

 destined to be excluded from access to 

 publicly-supported European research and technology 

 development at the level of principal contractors. If the 

 EC succeeds in opening up national procurement 

 policies and markets on the basis of equality of access 

 for EC -based firms, American high-tech small and 

 medium enterprises (SMEs) — who currently receive 



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