FAQ

Attachment to the ELIXIR Business Plan February 2011

Implementation of ELIXIR: Frequently Asked Questions

on Legal and Governance Issues

This document lists important and frequently asked questions regarding
legal and governance issues related to the implementation of ELIXIR
using the mechanism of an EMBL Special Project. They are meant to
provide additional information to the recipients of the ELIXIR
Business Case - mainly government officials and funding agencies - in
the countries that are considering becoming members of ELIXIR. More
and detailed information are available under http://www.elixireurope.
org/page.php

List of questions:

1) What is the EMBL Special Project and what are the advantages?
2) What is the EMBL Special Project in a legal sense?
3) Is a later transaction to an ERIC possible?
4) What is EMBL's role $-1òó in particular EMBL Council - within the EMBL
Special Project model?
5) What will be the contents of the ICA?
6) Binding versus non-binding ICA
7) What will be the next step on the way to the ICA?
8) What will be the membership structure of ELIXIR?
9) Do EMBL Member States have to become members in ELIXIR?
10) Which countries can become an ELIXIR MS?
11) Is it problematic whether a government is a member both of EMBL
and ELIXIR?
12) Is it problematic if EMBL is a member in ELIXIR?
13) What does the organisational model look like?
14) What are the tasks of the ELIXIR Hub?
15) Who determines ELIXIR's strategy and policy in scientific and
administrative matters?
16) How will decisions be executed?
17) What mechanism will be in place to secure high quality?
18) How can national research and funding institutes participate in
the decision making / strategic process?
19) Under what conditions will staff at the ELIXIR Hub be employed?
20) What is the difference between staff working for ELIXIR and staff
working for EMBL?
21) Who is liable for damages caused in relation with ELIXIR?
22) What are the criteria to become an ELIXIR Node and who decides
about it?
23) What is the relationship between the ELIXIR Hub and a Node?
24) What is the financial contribution of an ELIXIR Member State?
25) What will be EMBL's contribution?
26) Will there be funding from the European Commission?
27) What will be the financial contribution at national level?




I. The EMBL special project model
1) What is the EMBL Special Project and what are the advantages?

ELIXIR will initially be established using the mechanism of an "EMBL
Special Project". Under this model ELIXIR will be established as a
special project under the institutional umbrella of the European
Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL), an intergovernmental organization
that plays a key role in the field of European life sciences. The
details will be defined in an International Consortium Agreement
(ICA), which will be agreed by the ELIXIR members, i.e. states and
EMBL.

Organisationally, ELIXIR will be based on a Hub and Nodes Model, the
Hub will be located physically at the EMBL-EBI site in the UK and
provide for an administrative governance structure. Nodes will be
located at centres of excellence in the ELIXIR member states and all
will contribute to the tasks of ELIXIR.

The EMBL Special Project is an attractive solution at this stage,
since it is fast and easy to set up. It takes advantage of EMBL's
existing legal personality and its privileges and immunities; it
benefits from EMBL's experience and reputation in managing an
international research infrastructure. At a later stage the
infrastructure could be transferred into an organization having its
own legal personality for example as a European Research
Infrastructure Consortium (ERIC).

II. Legal nature of the special project
2) What is the EMBL Special Project in a legal sense?

As an EMBL Special Project ELIXIR will benefit from EMBL's legal
personality. Legal transactions for ELIXIR will be handled using
EMBL's legal personality The ELIXIR Hub will profit from privileges
and immunities granted to EMBL. EMBL will be bound to the provisions
of the ICA and the decisions of the Consortium partners. Thus,
ELIXIR's independence and visibility is guaranteed. It will be subject
to the negotiations of the ICA if it will become a binding or
nonbinding international agreement.

3) Is a later transaction to an ERIC possible?

The European Research Infrastructure Consortium (ERIC) is a legal
framework that has been designed by the European Commission to
facilitate the establishment and operation of research infrastructures
of European interest. It is based on a European Regulation that was
adopted in June 2009. An ERIC is a legal entity with legal personality
that is recognized in all EU MS once it has passed the national and
European application processes.

A transition to an ERIC should be easily possible because both, the
EMBL Special Project and ERIC, have many parallel criteria, including
similar prerequisites to come to existence:

* Non-economic activities

* European added value

* Statutes (ERIC) / International Consortium Agreement (EMBL Special
Project)

* Members will be states and Intergovernmental Organisations

* Organisation/governance

4) What is EMBL's role $-1òó in particular EMBL Council - within the EMBL Special Project model?

EMBL and its governance bodies will be involved in several capacities
to be specified and defined in the ICA. Part of EMBL's obligations
will be to host ELIXIR's Executive Management body including the
Secretariat and employ related staff. Employment contracts will be
based on the EMBL staff regulations. EMBL will ensure that ELIXIR's
assets, financial contributions and liabilities will be separately
identifiable within its own accounts. Separate auditing will give the
ELIXIR Consortium control and overview over their financial
contributions. Within the Consortium EMBL will be a proper member
having the same rights as any other member. EMBL Council $-1òó EMBL's
strategic and decision making body representing EMBL MS - will have no
direct influence on the infrastructure's strategic decisions except
regarding the general question of EMBL's participation or rejection in
the infrastructure as well as EMBL`s position as a Consortium member.

5) What will be the contents of the ICA?

The ICA will be concluded by the ELIXIR Consortium members. The ICA
will include ELIXIR's mission and strategy, the organisation, rights
and obligations of the ELIXIR members. Thereby ELIXIR's identity and
visibility will be ensured. In particular it could include for example
the following provisions:


Purpose and mission of the infrastructure

* Governance structure

* Mission and powers of the governance bodies

* Contributions, rights and obligations of the members

* The role and contributions of the hub and nodes

* Implementation of the EMBL Special Project (e.g. location,
facilities, services, ...)

* Budget

* Liabilities

* Durations and evaluation of the infrastructure

6) Binding versus non-binding ICA

The ICA could be set up as a binding or non-binding
instrument. Whether an international agreement is binding or not,
depends on its terms and the circumstances in which it was drawn up.
A non-binding agreement will make the ICA a flexible instrument, which
will be relatively speedy to set up compared to binding
treaties. However, none of the provisions will be enforceable. A
binding agreement forces the parties to comply with the rights and
obligations arising from it. Obligations become enforceable. The
implementation procedures vary from country to country. Especially
ratification procedures can take a long time. Granting a binding
character to the ICA may make the negotiations and, eventually, the
entry into force of the ICA a longer or more difficult process but
will provide more stability to the organization and allow building a
successful organization based on a long-term vision.

7) What will be the next step on the way to the ICA?

Interested countries are invited to sign a non-binding Memorandum of
Understanding (MoU) that will be available in spring 2011. The MoU
expresses the signatories' general interest in ELIXIR and the intent
to evaluate their future membership in ELIXIR, (constructed under the
aegis of an EMBL Special Project), as well as the possibility to
provide funding to the ELIXIR Hub and Nodes. An interim ELIXIR Board
that will consist of members from interested future ELIXIR members
will start negotiating the ICA in the course of 2011. Information will
soon be available on the ELIXIR webpage.


III. Requirements for membership
8) What will be the membership structure of ELIXIR?

The members of ELIXIR will be states and International Organisations
that will be able to join a Consortium and sign an ICA. The members
will certainly be allowed to appoint national institutes that may act
as representatives. This will facilitate decision making processes and
will allow for an easy transfer to an ERIC later on if
appropriate. Delegations to the ELIXIR Board will probably consist of
an administrative and a scientific representative appointed by the
respective governments.

9) Do EMBL Member States have to become members in ELIXIR?

It is not mandatory for EMBL Member States to become members of ELIXIR
but their membership would be highly appreciated. All European
countries benefit from the biological data resources that will be
provided by ELIXIR; their pharmaceutical, agricultural and food
industries depend on them as well as their biomedical research
communities.

10) Which countries can become an ELIXIR MS?

All ESFRI member states could join ELIXIR.

11) What is the difference between EMBL and ELIXIR?

EMBL and ELIXIR serve different well defined purposes and offer
different services.

Although ELIXIR will complement the existing EMBL-EBI services it will
have its own profile. The major goal of ELIXIR is to generate an
infrastructure, involving the hub and the nodes, to provide the vital
services for biological information in Europe. It will create new ways
to cope with the rising amount of data. ELIXIR will allow spreading
the technical and financial workload among the future members of
ELIXIR and critically ensure good connectivity between partners,
removing duplication and waste. It will also lead to a truly European
RI that extends the existing collection of data in a sensible way and
will include nodes in many countries providing services at European
level.

Consequently, EMBL and ELIXIR are separate from each other regarding
their funding and control mechanisms. It will be necessary to
establish transparent funding for all partner organizations (hub and
nodes) to remove the risk of $-1òødouble funding' for any institution.

12) Will EMBL be a member of ELIXIR?

EMBL will be a member of ELIXIR. It is common that an International
Organisation is a member of another International Organisation or of
an international project (e.g. the European Union is a member of
WTO[1]). EMBL Member States would have to decide about EMBL's role
within ELIXIR, independent of them being a member of the
infrastructure themselves.

[1] For more information see:
http://www.wto.org/english/thewto_e/countries_e/european_communities_e.htm

IV. Organisation
13) What is the organisational model?

ELIXIR will be organised on the basis of a "hub and nodes"-model. The
coordination of ELIXIR's mission and activities and the integration of
the ELIXIR nodes will be executed and administered by a coordinating
hub, which will be located at the EMBL-EBI.



ELIXIR nodes are located at centres of excellence in the ELIXIR member
states. The nodes will have their own legal personalities and will
provide services on behalf of ELIXIR. The ELIXIR Hub will connect to
ELIXIR Nodes via bilateral Service Level Agreements that will define
their mutual responsibilities and obligations within ELIXIR. The hub
and nodes will each take responsibility for providing a defined set of
scientific and technical activities that are in line with the
strategic priorities of ELIXIR and are accessible to researchers
throughout Europe.

14) What are the tasks of the ELIXIR Hub?

The ELIXIR Hub will host the ELIXIR Executive Management, which will
report to the ELIXIR Board on delivery of ELIXIR activities. The
Executive Management will comprise a Chief Executive Officer supported
by a small secretariat with administrative, financial and legal
expertise. They will be responsible for coordinating and leading the
infrastructure; ensuring that its service provision is of the highest
quality; liaising with ELIXIR member states; implementing the service-
level agreements with the ELXIR Nodes; arranging meetings of the
ELIXIR Board and the SAB; planning and securing ELIXIR's financial
sustainability, including applications for pan-European funding; and
representing Europe in global bioinformatics initiatives. Furthermore
the ELIXIR Hub will include delivery of the EMBL-EBI core data
services.

15) Who determines ELIXIR's strategy and policy in scientific and
administrative matters?

The ELIXIR Board determines ELIXIR's strategy and policy in
scientific, technical and administrative matters, in particular by
giving guidelines to the Chief Executive Officer. It is composed of
representatives from the ELIXIR members preferably being a scientific
and an administrative delegate. Each country and EMBL will have one
vote.

16) How will decisions be executed?

The ELIXIR Board decides on issues relating to budget and the
strategic programme. It establishes and monitors rules and procedures,
including those for the process and selection of ELIXIR Nodes. The
ELIXIR Board is advised by the SAB.

The ELIXIR Board will appoint the ELIXIR Executive Management to
manage and administer ELIXIR in accordance with the decisions of the
ELIXIR Board. The Secretariat will be established to assist and
facilitate the activities of the ELIXIR Executive Management.

17) What mechanism will be in place to secure high quality?

The SAB advises the ELIXIR Board and Executive Management in
scientific matters that include the selection of ELIXIR nodes and
ensuring high quality contributions to ELIXIR. It is one of the most
important bodies since it ensures the infrastructure's scientific
independence and excellence.

18) How can national research and funding institutes participate in
the decision making / strategic process?

Each member state is invited to send two delegates to the ELIXIR Board
of whom one should represent the government/ministry and the second
the scientific community. National research institutes and funding
organizations will only be allowed to participate in the decision
making / strategic process if they were authorized by the respective
government to represent it. Otherwise representatives from national
organisations could be invited as observers by the ELIXIR Board.


V. Staff working at the ELIXIR hub
19) Under what conditions will staff at the ELIXIR Hub be employed?

The tasks linked to ELIXIR will be of administrative and scientific
nature and make employment of new staff necessary. In particular the
Chief Executive Officer supported by a small Secretariat with
administrative, financial, legal expertise as well as scientific and
technical staff, who are based at the hub, would be employed by EMBL
according to EMBL staff regulations. At the moment it is envisaged
that additional scientific activities at the level of the hub will
result in the employment of around 100 new employees. EMBL is an
International Organisation that is exempted from national laws in
certain legal fields as described in its founding statutes and thus
granted by its Member states. In the field of labour law EMBL was
allowed to develop its own staff regulations, which become
automatically applicable to anybody employed as "staff" at EMBL. These
regulations offer certain privileges and immunities for example
exemption from income tax from income tax.

The nodes will employ staff who is responsible for ELIXIR activities
locally. For each node the relevant National labour law will be
applicable.

20) What is the difference between staff working for ELIXIR and staff
working for EMBL?

There is no difference in a legal sense since EMBL and ELIXIR staff
will have the same employment contracts based on EMBL staff
regulations. However ELIXIR staff will carry out tasks agreed by the
ELIXIR Board and their salaries will be financed by ELIXIR's Member
States.

VI. Liability
21) Who is liable for damages caused in relation with ELIXIR?

Since ELIXIR has no legal personality, EMBL would be liable for any
damage which has a causal link with a fault committed by ELIXIR
staff. It is very likely that the liability risk will be shared among
ELIXIR Member States. Third party claims against a node will basically
be dealt with by the node itself.

VII. Nodes $-1òó general requirements
22) What are the criteria to become an ELIXIR Node and who decides
about it?

The ELIXIR Board as the strategic body will decide on the criteria to
become an ELIXIR node. Most likely a node will be a national or
international research organisation that applies (alone or in
collaboration with others) to join ELIXIR. They will have to provide
activities that have an added value for ELIXIR, a European dimension
and matching funds from other funders to carry out ELIXIR related
activities. The final decision on the applications will be taken by
the ELIXIR Board advised by the SAB.

A call for expression of interest of potential ELIXIR nodes was
launched in April 2010. More than 50 expressions of interest were
submitted representing one or more national institutes. These
expressions of interest were presented to funding agencies from
interested future ELIXIR member states in October 2010.

23) What is the relationship between the ELIXIR Hub and a Node?

Once accepted as a Node, all rights and obligations will be agreed in
a bilateral service level agreement between EMBL $-1òó acting for ELIXIR òó
and the Node. The agreement could include for example which tasks
would have to be carried out, reporting duties, quality assurance and
scientific evaluation processes, provision of facilities and staff
dedicated to the infrastructure's mission and financial commitments.

VIII. Funding and financial issues

24) What is the financial contribution of an ELIXIR Member State?

Member States are expected to provide for funding dedicated to the
ELIXIR Node(s) in their own country and to the ELIXIR Hub.

Funding for the ELIXIR Hub could be provided in several ways. EMBL MS
could use the EMBL indicative scheme, which is the 5-year budget
plan. All other states could provide ELIXIR funding separate from the
EMBL indicative scheme. The details will be subject to negotiations of
the ICA.

The ELIXIR budget will be ring-fenced from other EMBL activities and
the ELIXIR Executive management will report to the ELIXIR Board on the
use of the budget. Funding for the ELIXIR Hub would be used to finance
the Secretariat and its personnel as well as scientific staff.

25) What will be EMBL's contribution?

EMBL will have the same obligations as any other member of the
infrastructure. Its contributions as a host (staff, facilities and
administrative support) will be taken into account and details will be
subject to negotiations in the framework of the ICA.

26) Will there be funding from the European Commission?

The European Commission recognises the importance of European research
infrastructures as a prerequisite for scientific excellence and their
value for international competition. FP7 lists infrastructures as one
of the top priority topics. Until now EC funding has been made
available through a number of instruments that supported development
of common standards and tools, user access and training and
e-infrastructures. It can be anticipated that the EC will continue to
provide project-based funding for similar activities including the
integration of data resources required by other biomedical research
infrastructures in the next EU Framework Programme.

27) What will be the financial contribution at national level?

The nodes are mostly national institutions that already receive
funding from national funders in order to carry out their everyday
business. Depending on the national system for research funding,
financial contributions are either provided directly from the
ministries or from executive institutions that are directly linked to
the government. Funding could also come from independent funding
organizations that have no direct link to the government.

Nodes should receive sustainable funding that will allow them to carry
out ELIXIR related activities.

FYI

Dear ELIXIR Stakeholders

I am writing to present the new European biological information research structure – ELIXIR and to inform you that the competent national authorities in the European member states have been invited to consider joining it.

ELIXIR’s mission is to construct and operate a sustainable structure for biological information in Europe to support life science research and its translation to medicine and the environment, the bio-industries and society. This mission reflects the fact that biological information is vital for life science research and innovation, and for tackling the challenges of healthcare for an ageing population, food security, energy diversification and environmental protection. Today biomolecular research is generating massive amounts of data and there is a pressing need to provide infrastructure that will handle this and also be able to integrate new types of data in a meaningful way. This requires coordination and effort on the European level.

ELIXIR was identified as a priority by the European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures (ESFRI) in its 2006 Roadmap for Research Infrastructures. Under the Seventh Framework Programme the European Commission has funded a preparatory phase, which will end by the end of 2011.

During the preparation phase hundreds of data providers and users from academia and the private sector were consulted, based on the results the ELIXIR’s steering committee concluded that ELIXIR should be built as a structure that is distributed across several sites hosted by centres of excellence distributed throughout Europe (the ‘ELIXIR Nodes’). These sites should be connected to a central hub (the ‘ELIXIR Hub’) located at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory’s European Bioinformatics Institute (EMBL-EBI) at Hinxton, UK. I am pleased to inform you that on 9 February 2011 UK has earmarked considerable funding for the construction of the Elixir hub which is subject to approval of the ELIXIR Business Case by the UK government. Also Denmark, Finland, Spain and Sweden have already committed funds towards developing ELIXIR, and have thus shown their commitment to ELIXIR’s mission.

In the attached ELIXIR Business Case you will find a detailed presentation of the rational for ELIXIR, the proposed hub and spokes structure, the legal and governance organisation, funding requirements, and the Action Plan for the period 2011- 2013. Attached is also a catalogue of “Frequently Asked Questions” that serves for clarification of ELIXIR’s legal and governance structure.

Governments have been invited to sign the attached non-binding Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), which is the first step towards negotiations for the construction of ELIXIR. Negotiations will begin when there are six signatories to the MoU. Following the signing of the MoU the negotiation of an International Consortium Agreement will begin in the autumn 2011. Countries subscribing to ELIXIR by signing the MoU will be represented in the Interim Board which will drive ELIXIR to its operational phase. Inter alia, the Interim Board will appoint the Scientific Advisory Board which will be closely involved in the selection of national nodes.

Your support is highly appreciated and we encourage you to be proactive in expressing your support for ELIXIR to your government.

Should you need more information, please do not hesitate to contact me.

--
Nicola Slater
ELIXIR Scientific Administrator
European Bioinformatics Institute, Hinxton, Cambridge, CB10 1SD, UK
Tel: +44 (0) 1223 492670
Email: nslater@ebi.ac.uk

On behalf of ELIXIR Project Coordinator, Prof Janet Thornton

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