DN: The award of PhD degree is optional for the standard Doctoral Networks and for the Industrial Doctorates. Is it still mandatory that at least one beneficiary or associated partner/ associated partner linked to a beneficiary be entitled to award doctoral degrees?

The deliverable related to award of the degree is indeed optional. However, what is not optional is that all PhD candidates must be enrolled in a PhD programme. Therefore, there must be institutions in the consortium that are entitled to award doctoral degrees – otherwise they cannot have a PhD programme. In principle, it is expected that all PhD candidates in all DNs work towards obtaining a PhD degree.