The Framework Programmes for Research and Innovation (FPRI) are the EU's main instrument for implementing its science and technology policy. They were set up primarily with the aim of boosting innovation on the European continent by linking up Europe's research and innovation capacities across borders. The EU framework programmes are particularly important for Switzerland's international cooperation in research and innovation.
Switzerland and the EU have a long-standing and successful collaboration in the field of research and innovation. As early as 1978, Switzerland concluded a research agreement with the European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom) in a bid to foster closer research cooperation in Europe. Swiss researchers also began taking part in selected FPRI projects in 1987. Until the end of 2003, researchers at institutions based in Switzerland, being classed as third-country participants, only had limited opportunities to take part and had to be funded directly by the Swiss federal government. From 1 January 2004, an agreement between Switzerland and the EU enabled Switzerland to participate in the 6th FPRI (2003–06) and the Euratom Research and Training Programme as an associated country with all the relevant rights and obligations. Switzerland's full participation in the framework programme as an associated country is based on the Bilateral Agreements I (1999). These include the Agreement on the Free Movement of Persons (AFMP) and six other, sectoral agreements, including the research agreement. The FPRI are time-limited, which means that the research agreement is the only agreement of the Bilaterals I that has to be renewed for each generation of the programme. It was renewed in 2007 for the entire 7th FPRI (2007–13). The 8th FPRI (Horizon 2020) was launched on 1 January 2014 and ran for seven years (until the end of 2020). Horizon 2020 combined the FPRIs, which had previously been running separately, the Euratom programme and the ITER international fusion reactor project. On 5 December 2014, Switzerland and the EU signed an agreement on Switzerland's partial association to Horizon 2020, which applied retroactively from 15 September 2014 to the end of 2016. Switzerland was therefore already taking part as an associated country in some aspects of Horizon 2020 before it became a fully associated member of the entire Horizon 2020 programme, including Euratom, from 1 January 2017.