According to the Report on the European Research Council's operations and realisation of the objectives set out in the Specific Programme Ideas in 2010 published by the European Commission, funding schemes put in place by the institutions have captured the interest of the European Research community. The report highlights that more than 20,000 applications have been presented under the first six calls.

Proof of the interest for the European Research Council (ERC) funding schemes supporting research activities, is the fact that while in 2009 about 400 journal articles acknowledging the ERC were recorded, their number tripled in 2010. This success is due to a combination of rising number of projects and maturing projects producing more results. As a consequence, The Scientific Council is discussing how to diversify and broaden its programmes, always on the basis of the principles which have made the first two schemes successful: investigator-driven proposals, rigorous peer review based on scientific excellence.

According to the Report on the European Research Council's operations for year 2010, commitments of more than 1.1 billion Euro were fully executed in the implementation of the programme as well as payments of 528 million Euro, representing 100% of the operational appropriations of the "Ideas" Specific Programme for 2010. Around 2.58% of the operational
budget was spent on administration.

In the area of grants supporting research activities, the report shows that 2,873 proposals were received for the 2010 ERC Starting Grant call published in July 2009. Among them 1,205 proposals focused in Physical Sciences and Engineering, 1,230 in Life Sciences and 638 in Social Sciences and Humanities. A total of 436 proposals were funded with a budget of more than 537 million Euro and an average award of around 1.2 million Euro.

Regarding 2010 ERC Advanced Grant call published in October 2009, 2,009 proposals were received in total. Physical Sciences and Engineering remained on top of the areas represented with 902 proposals, followed by 621 in Life Sciences and 486 in Social Sciences and Humanities.

In both funding schemes, the calls for proposals published for next year (ERC Starting Grant for 2011 and ERC Advanced Grant for 2011) have registered an increase in the proposals that have been received which shows an unbroken demand for funding of excellent research at European level.