D2.1: First Report on PRACE 2.0 Development

The focus of this deliverable is to report on the status of the early stage of the implementation process of the second period of operations of the PRACE pan-European Research Infrastructure, so-called PRACE 2, that will succeed between 2016 and 2020 the PRACE agreement for the Initial Period (referred to as PRACE 1 in this deliverable). In addition to the main topic of this deliverable, this document reports briefly on the legal support provided by Work Package 2 of PRACE-4IP regarding the copyrights for the PRACE training material and for the PRACE Research Infrastructure related to the collaboration with other research infrastructures.
After recalling the vision of PRACE, this deliverable summarises the outcome of the initial period of PRACE pointing out the needed changes in the face of the transition from PRACE 1 to PRACE 2. This deliverable concentrates on the analysis of the different elements of the PRACE 2 model such as governance, funding and VAT aspects. A detailed analysis of the VAT aspects is undertaken in order to evaluate if the European VAT Directives exempt PRACE from VAT. In addition, a comparison with other research infrastructures concerning governance, funding and Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) is presented.
For some of the topics covered in this deliverable the analysis is based on the formulation of legal questions related to these topics, and on an evaluation of answers provided by the legal advisor firm Bird & Bird LLP assisting PRACE.