EURAXESS South Korea was officially launched by Ambassador of the European Union to the Republic of Korea Dr. Michael Reiterer in Seoul, said EU Delegation Seoul.

Stressing that scientists are migratory beasts, EURAXESS office side touched upon benefits of mobility such as larger int’l network, higher performance and access to knowledge etc., to name just a few in their launching event, held at the FourSeasons Hotel Seoul last Friday.

The EURAXESS initiative supports mobility and career development of researchers from all over the world with the main emphasis of providing information on the European research institutions, European funding opportunities and job vacancies. EURAXESS is coordinated by the European Commission, the Directorate General for Research and Innovation.

Regarding its mission and role, EURAXESS highlighted that it is a joint initiative of 40 European countries funded by the European Commission-100% free services as well as EURAXESS.org is a wealth of services under one online portal. In Korea, further EURAXESS will aim to foster interest in Europe and create a community of similar-minded researchers, said an official from EURAXESS Korea Office.

More than 150 participants discussed topics related to mobility of researchers, international cooperation and joint EU-Korea projects. The event was desgined around panel discussions and 2 parallel workshops where researchers had to opportunity to get insights on how to submit proposals under the prestigious European funding schemes for individual researchers from the Marie Curie Sklodovska Actions and the European Research Council.

The Ambassador officially opened the South Korean Chapter, in his speech he highlighted the importance of collaboration between Korea and Europe in scientific fields. In a festive ceremony we launched the innitiative. Ms Fabienne Gautier from the European Commission underlined the outstanding opportunitities provided by the European Horizon 2020 funding programm for research and innovation, which is the largest in the world. She underlinded the European Welcoming culture and openness to the world.

Dr Matthieu Py and Dr Tomasz Wierzbowski are as from now on the EURAXESS representatives for South Korea working with and for the research community.