Financing Research and Technology Infrastructures
Speakers and panelists
Acting Director, ERA & Innovation, DG RTD, European Commission
Jean-David Malo
Jean-David Malo joined the European Commission in 2001. He was appointed Director for Open Innovation and Open Science in 2017 and in June 2019 Director of the EIC Task Force. Since April 2025, he is the acting Director for ERA and Innovation in DG RTD.
Jean Daillant
Director General, ESRF
Experimental physicist Jean Daillant specializes in soft-condensed matter and nanomaterials. With 120+ publications, he’s led key labs and served as Director General of SOLEIL and now ESRF. Renowned for his work on synchrotron radiation and interfaces, he advances nanoscale analysis and self-assembled materials, and is a leader in major European scientific consortia promoting accelerator-based photon science.
Brendan McDonagh
EIB European Investment Bank
Brendan McDonagh is a Senior Adviser at EIB’s Public and Infrastructure Finance Advisory Services Division. Brendan manages a range of advisory assignments in the climate and transport areas supporting public sector promoters to bring their proposals from concept stage to implementation with associated finance. He is the EIB Advisory Lead supporting the European Commission Directorate General for Research and Innovation - Climate Neutral and Smart Cities Mission - under Horizon Europe. He was the EIB lead in preparing the recently published report on addressing the funding needs of Technology Infrastructures. Brendan joined EIB in 2016 and worked in Western Europe Lending Division and in the Innovation Finance Advisory Division before taking up his current post in 2019.
Ulla Gro Nielsen
Director, Novo Nordisk Foundation
Director Ulla Gro Nielsen is head of Technical Sciences Department at the Novo Nordisk Foundation, Denmark specializing in infrastructure, technology and data science across the strategic areas of the foundation. The vision of the Novo Nordisk Foundation is to improve people’s health and the sustainability of society and the planet. She previously served as Professor at University of Southern Denmark and holds a Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of Aarhus. Her research activities focused on environmental, materials and quantum chemistry.
Secretary General for Research, Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities, Spain
Eva Ortega-Paino