In December 1965 EMBO secured a grant from the Volkswagen Foundation to fund their activities for 3 years. EMBO was keen that it’s financial support from the VW foundation not be permanent, as it wished for its long term funding to come from all participating nations, rather than organisations belonging to just one in order to ensure its independence.
EMBO, alongside its Swiss partners, organized two “temporary” conferences attended by governmental representatives to establish a consensus for an inter-governmental organization. The two focus points of these meetings were the long-term management of EMBO’s programs, and the question of establishing a European Laboratory.
Through these two conferences the constitution of the European Molecular Biology Conference was established, and in 1970, 14 governments officially established the EMBC, which to the present day supports EMBO’s General Programme. Over the years this programme has expanded through the EMBC creating “special projects” to allow new activities to be performed. It was through this process that the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) was created.