ECRIN is a distributed ESFRI-roadmap pan-European infrastructure designed to support multinational clinical research, making Europe a single area for clinical studies, taking advantage of its population size to access patients. Servicing multinational trials started during its preparatory phase, and it now applies for an ERIC status by 2011. The ERIC budget will be restricted to core activities required to enable provision of services, and the ECRIN-IA project is designed to expand ECRIN partnerships and impact beyond this core activity.Networking activities will promote pan-European expansion, capacity building, and partnership with other world regions, and address the funding issue (WP2). ECRIN-IA will develop e-services, education material to train professionals and patients associations, and communication with users, patients, citizens and policymakers (WP3). It will support the structuring and connection to ECRIN of disease-, technology-, or product-oriented investigation networks and hubs focusing on specific areas: rare diseases (WP4), medical device (WP5), nutrition (WP6).Transnational access activities will support the cost of multinational extension of clinical trials on rare diseases, medical device and nutrition selected by the ECRIN scientific board (WP7).Joint research activities are designed to improve the efficiency of ECRIN services, through the development of tools for risk-adapted monitoring (WP8), and the upgrade of the VISTA data management tool (WP9).This project will build a consistent organisation for clinical research in Europe, with ECRIN developing generic tools and providing generic services to multinational studies, and supporting the construction of pan-European disease-oriented networks, that will in turn act as ECRIN users and provide the scientific content. Such organisation will improve Europe’s attractiveness for industry trials, boost its scientific competitiveness, and result in better healthcare for European citizens.