주관연구개발기관 (lead research institution)

The 주관연구개발기관 is the lead research and development institution: the organisation that signs the agreement and answers for the whole project. It holds the contract, receives the funds, distributes them to participating institutions, and is accountable for delivery.

Participating institutions (공동연구개발기관) carry out their own share of the work and their own costs, but they do not hold the agreement. The relationship is closer to a prime contractor and its subcontractors than to a Horizon consortium of equals.

The difference from a European coordinator is liability rather than workload. A Horizon coordinator administers and has no responsibility for another beneficiary's debts; a Korean lead institution carries financial responsibility for the project as a whole, including for the return of funds not properly spent.

The lead is normally required to be Korean. That is the structural reason a foreign organisation joins Korean national R&D as a participant rather than as an applicant, and why the choice of Korean lead partner matters more than the equivalent choice in Europe.

For anyone negotiating a place on such a project, the questions worth asking early are which institution will be the lead, what share of the budget flows to participants and on what schedule, and how the results will be owned. The Innovation Act sets the framework, but the distribution inside it is agreed between the parties.