Established by the European Commission in 2007, the ERC is composed of an independent Scientific Council, its governing body consisting of distinguished researchers, and an Executive Agency, in charge of the implementation.

Under Horizon 2020 it is estimated that around 7,000 ERC grantees will be funded and 42,000 team members supported, including 11,000 doctoral students and almost 16,000 post-doctoral researchers.

The aim is to recognise the best ideas, and confer status and visibility to the best research in Europe, while also attracting talent from abroad.

However, its realisation was held back at the political level because the founding treaties of the European Union was interpreted as allowing union funding only to strengthen the scientific and technological base of European industry – that is, only funding for applied research rather than basic research.

In 2004, a high-level expert group was commissioned to further explore the possibilities of creating a European Research Council.

In January 2014, after the end of Helga Nowotny's term of office, Professor Jean-Pierre Bourguignon became ERC president.

In May 2019, internationally recognized nanomedicine scientist Mauro Ferrari was named the next president of the European Research Council.

The ERC Scientific Council has established two Standing Committees: one deals with conflict of interest issues, the other oversees the selection of reviewers and panel lists.

The fact that most Scientific staff hold a PhD, have done post-docs and/or have been academics reinforces the feeling among panellists and the Scientific Community as a whole that ERC Schemes are implemented by scientists understanding the pitfalls and hurdles of Research and who are constantly working to better their procedures in order to simplify the application as well as the granting processes, hand in hand with their colleagues from financial units.

That is a substantial increase from its initial seven-year budget under the EU's seventh Research Framework Programme (2007–2013), when the total allocated to the ERC was €7.5 billion.

It does not want its carefully selected grantees to waste their time by taking on numerous peripheral projects, or constantly having to seek additional money to fund their research.

The applicant can be of any nationality and age, and needs to demonstrate an excellent track record and present a ground-breaking research proposal.