ERA4Health Partnership 2027 “IICS4all”

Full details on the Call are available on the Call website (ERA4Health IICS4all 2027).

Please see the Call Text for the full list of Requirements and Recommendations for the Call.

Out of Scope

• Phase I and Phase II studies.
• Basic and pre-clinical biomedical research and research involving animals or animal tissue.
• Development of a new healthcare intervention.
• Proposals focused on observational studies, non-interventional cohort studies, implementation studies, translational/clinical approval studies, creation of large databases, systematic reviews and meta-analysis. Non-randomised studies.
• Studies in medical areas other than the ones mentioned above. Particularly, clinical trials that are focused on cancer are out of scope for this call.
• Topics not eligible for Horizon Europe funding.
• For comparative effectiveness studies, the use of placebo is restricted to blinding of the interventions being compared.
• For drug repurposing studies: a drug (including biological medicinal products and biosimilars) still on patent in one of the participating countries.
• Clinical studies conducted for direct commercial purposes.
• Medicinal products without marketing authorisation in Europe and in other countries outside the EU/EEA involved in the respective consortium.
• Medical devices without CE mark.

Irish Partner(s) are not eligible for HRB funding for:

• Proposals involving basic biomedical research;[1]
• Research intended to create human embryos solely for the purposes of research or for the purposes of stem cell procurement, including by means of somatic cell nuclear transfer;
• Applications from individuals applying for, holding, or employed under funding received from the tobacco industry;[2]
• Applications from individuals applying for, holding, or employed under funding received from the alcohol industry and related actors;[3]

[1] Basic biomedical research refers to very early stage, fundamental research.

[2] Any company, entity, or organisation involved in the development, production, promotion, marketing, or sale of tobacco in any country of the world. The term also includes any companies that are a subsidiary or a holding company or affiliate of the above. This also includes e-cigarette companies and non-tobacco related companies which are fully or partially owned by the tobacco industry.

[3] Including social aspects/public relations organisations (SAPROs) funded by alcohol companies or trade associations in which such companies are members.

Projects are expected to start between January and May 2028.

Awards will have a duration of up to 48 months.

Please note: Funding granted under this Call is co-funded by the European Union and relevant national/regional funding organisations.  Applicants requesting funds from the HRB are responsible for complying with all applicable EU rules, regulations and guidance associated with this funding, in addition to HRB’s Grant Terms and Conditions.

Detailed budgets must be provided at full-proposal stage and must comply with all applicable EU and HRB funding rules. Eligible costs and funding rules may vary between the respective funding organisations (see the Call Text for further information).

For applicants based in Ireland, the HRB will provide funding for proposals up to a maximum of €650,000 per grant. Funding available is inclusive of overheads and pension contributions.

The HRB intends to commit up to €1,500,000 to the ERA4Health IICS4all 2027 call. Quality permitting, it is anticipated that one to two grants will be funded.

The grant will offer research-related costs for:

• Personnel: Salary-related costs in line with the most recent IUA (or other most applicable) scale for funded personnel
• Direct running costs (including travel, patient-related costs)
  • Sub-contracting costs for the provision of a service in Ireland can be requested up to a maximum of 20% of direct costs. Sub-contracting must conform to the Host Institution, National and EU procurement rules. These costs should be necessary, specific to the project, and proportionate, and they should normally constitute only a limited part of the study.
• PPI costs
• Small equipment costs (not to exceed €10k)
• FAIR data management costs: Data stewardship costs (e.g. service/fees from data steward, access to secondary data, costs of making data FAIR, etc.)
• Dissemination and knowledge exchange activities (including open access scientific publications, dissemination-related travel, etc.)
• Overheads contribution

Please refer to the “HRB ERA4Health IICS4all Budget Guidance 2027” for full details.

Funded Personnel

Alignment between personnel requested and the proposed project should be demonstrated. Roles and responsibilities of funded personnel must be differentiated and clear

Note: As this scheme is not framed as a training initiative for higher degree candidates, the HRB will not fund postgraduate stipends and fees. Additionally, the salary and related costs of tenured academic staff within research institutions (including buy-out from teaching time etc.) will not be funded.

The budget requested and the award duration must reflect the scale and nature of the proposed research and can only fund activities taking place in Ireland.

ECRIN

ECRIN (the European Clinical Research Infrastructure Network) can act as a Service Provider to consortia in the IICS4all call. It can provide cross-cutting activities, supporting the Sponsor in the delivery of the multi-national investigator-led studies.

Additional budget of up to 15% of the total budget can be requested to support ECRIN-led cross cutting management activities. Please refer to the Call Text and Guidance for Applicants for full details on the provision of support by ECRIN.

To request ECRIN support, consortia must contact and engage with the relevant national ECRIN European Correspondent (EuCo) during the pre-proposal stage.

The ECRIN EuCo in Ireland is Niall Hore.  Please contact Niall directly to discuss seeking support from ECRIN (niall.hore@ucc.ie).

NOTE: The deadline for contacting the ECRIN representative to discuss support from ECRIN is 30 November 2026.

This call is not open for Host Institutions in Northern Ireland.

The IICS4all scheme supports multi-national IICS, and consortia must meet specific criteria as detailed in the Call Text.

A Partner search tool is available for this call. Please refer to the ERA4Health website for details.

Lead Applicants requesting HRB funding:

Note that HRB use the term ‘Lead Applicant’ to refer to a coordinator or Partner applying for HRB funding.

The Lead Applicant (LA) will serve as the primary point of contact for the HRB during the review process and on the grant, if successful. The LA will be responsible for the scientific and technical direction of the research programme in Ireland. They have primary fiduciary responsibility and accountability for carrying out the research within the funding limits awarded and in accordance with the terms and conditions of the HRB.

The following will apply to LA seeking HRB funding:

Lead Applicants must:

• Hold a post (permanent or a contract that covers the duration of the award) in a HRB recognised Host Institution in the Republic of Ireland (the “Host Institution”) as an independent investigator. For clinicians, an adjunct position in a HRB recognised Host Institution is acceptable (an accompanying letter of support is required in these cases, as well as in the case of contract positions – see ‘How to apply’ below).

OR

• Be an individual who will be recognised by the Host Institution upon receipt of a grant as an independent investigator who will have a dedicated office and research space for the duration of award, for which they will be fully responsible. The Lead Applicant does not necessarily need to be employed by the Host Institution at the time of the application submission (an accompanying letter of support is required in these cases – see ‘How to apply’ below).

They must show evidence of achievement as an independent researcher in their chosen research field by:

• Demonstrating a record of research output, with at least three publications of original research in peer reviewed journals. Where appropriate, they should also provide evidence of other outputs (e.g., published book chapters, reports to government, research data and datasets, research materials, databases, audio/video products, national and/or international reports, patents, models and protocols, software production, evidence of influence on health policy and practice, outreach and/or knowledge exchange activities, media coverage or other relevant activities) and/or any other relevant outputs that have resulted in a significant impact in their field.
• Demonstrating record of independence by showing that they have secured at least one independently peer-reviewed research grant for a research project, as either the Lead Applicant or a Co-Applicant. Funding received for travel to seminars/conferences and/or small personal bursaries will not be considered in this regard.
• Demonstrating relevant experience and expertise in leading and conducting clinical trials and other intervention studies.
• Show evidence that they possess the capability and authority to manage and supervise the research team.

Host Institution

The Host Institution is normally that of the Lead Applicant based in Ireland, but it may be another organisation/institution designated by the research team, where it is clearly justified. In order to be eligible to apply for funding, an Institution must be an approved HRB Host Institution no later than two calendar months before the closing date of a call. A list of currently approved HRB Host Institutions can be found on the HRB website.

HRB will contract with a single Host Institution (Lead Applicant). Additional national recruiting sites (Associate Partners) are permitted to join the consortium.

The Lead Applicant/HI will be responsible for appropriate distribution of funds to the associated partner(s) via collaboration and/or consortium agreements.

The HRB does not have a limit on the number of associated partners that will act as clinical study sites.

Application to IICS4all is a 2-stage process (for joint applications).

A single joint proposal document (in English) should be prepared by the Partners and must be submitted by the Coordinator in electronic format via the electronic proposal submission system no later than 12:00 CET (11:00 am GMT) on 14 January 2027 (a link is available on the ERA4Health IICS4all 2027 website). No other means of submission will be accepted.

Full details including links to the Pre-Proposal template and the online submission platform are available on the ERA4Health IICS4all 2027 webpage.

If you need additional information, please contact the Joint Call Secretariat (JCS). Please refer also to HRB Grant Policies.

Lead Applicants based in Ireland

LA based in Ireland will be required to provide additional information to the HRB at pre-proposal stage:

• New applicants to HRB’s Joint Transnational Calls must demonstrate that they meet the eligibility criteria by submitting a Lead Applicant eligibility form to HRB at least 3 days before the Pre-Proposal submission deadline. This does not apply to previous applicants to JTCs.
• Host Institution Letters of Support must be provided for (1) all named Lead Applicants in a contract position and (2) Adjunct Professors not directly employed by the HI. These must be emailed to EUTrials@hrb.ie or included with the LA Eligibility Form before the pre-proposal submission deadline.

This letter must be provided on institutional headed paper, dated and signed by the Head of School/Research Centre/Hospital and must include the following information:

• Case (1): [Host Institution – insert name] which is the host institution of [applicant – insert name] confirms that [applicant – insert name]: (i) holds an employment contract which extends until [insert date] or will be recognized by the host institution upon receipt of the HRB [scheme] award as a contract researcher; (ii) has an independent office and research space/facilities for which they are fully responsible for at least the duration of the award, and (iii) has the capability and authority to mentor and supervise the research team.
• Case (2): [Host Institution – insert name] confirms that [applicant – insert name] has the authority and resources allocated to hold and manage a grant under their Adjunct status for at least the duration of the award.

• The LA must send the final application to their respective Research Office (RO) to complete the HI JTC sign-off form and return this along with the application to HRB (see ‘Host Institution sign off’ below). Note: the deadline for HI sign-off and submission to HRB is three working days after the submission deadline. HRB recommends that the LA engage with their RO as early as possible in the application process, in order to ensure the documentation is completed and submitted to HRB within the required timeline.

For applicants invited to submit a Full Proposal, Partners based in Ireland must submit their budget along with a budget justification to HRB. No increase in requested budget from that submitted at Pre-Proposal stage is permitted. Some changes in budgets may be permitted in exceptional circumstances – please refer to the Call Text for further information. In addition, details on Deliverables assigned to the Partner in Ireland must also be submitted to HRB. Templates will be provided by the HRB at the time.

Please refer to HRB Grant Policies for policies governing HRB grants.

Aligned with HRB requirements for the submission of proposals, the Host Institutions of the LA must sign-off on the submission of the proposal. The ‘HI JTC sign off form’ (available on this page) must be signed by the authorised signatory of the HI (e.g. Dean of Research or equivalent person authorised to endorse research grant applications for the HI).

As noted under ‘How to Apply’ the LA must send the final application to their Research Office (RO). The RO should then complete the HI JTC sign off form, confirming the Lead Applicant is eligible and that the HI is willing to participate as HI for the application.

The completed Form and proposal should be sent to HRB (EUTrials@hrb.ie) within three working days following the Pre-Proposal submission deadline.

For general information, please contact the Joint Call Secretariat (JCS):

DLR Projektträger

Email: iics4all@dlr.de

For country-specific information for Irish Partners, please contact the HRB:

Dr Fiona Manning, Programme Manager
Dr Shannon Lee, Project Officer

Email: EUtrials@hrb.ie

ECRIN Representative in Ireland: Niall Hore

Email: niall.hore@ucc.ie