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Partnerships for better innovation support
S P E C I A L E D I T I O N Europe INNOVA 2nd Generation
Sectoral Innovation Watch Keeping an eye on the future of innovation > Page 2
Sweden proposes a Debate on a European Innovation Plan > Page 11
European Commission Enterprise and Industry
Year 4 - Issue 15 - September 2009
The newsletter of the Europe INNOVA initiative
Better innovation support as a ‘Grand Challenge’ Innovation policy is again under scrutiny. Many SMEs do not feel sufficiently supported in their innovation efforts and this was confirmed by the public consultation on the effectiveness of innovation support in the EU. There is too much general advice and too little concrete help. So, innovation support needs to be more focused and more strategically oriented in order to make a real impact. This is also the essence of the recent ‘Lund Declaration’ that concludes that Europe needs to mobilise substantially increased investments in research and innovation targeting ‘the Grand Challenges of our time.’ The declaration calls for a “new deal among European institutions and Member States, in which European and national instruments are well aligned and cooperation builds on transparency and trust.” Europe INNOVA must become part of this re-orientation of innovation policy, by moving from networking to partnerships and by providing reasonable solutions to
the ‘Grand Challenges’ that can be tackled by innovation. Europe INNOVA must become more result-oriented and offer better ways to support innovative SMEs, not only by words but, more importantly, also by deeds. This calls for a ‘new deal’ among the different institutions supporting SMEs such as, innovation agencies, incubation centres, cluster organisations, business angels and other investors. Better innovation support mechanisms need to be developed, in particular, in those areas that are of societal concern. And for me, competitiveness remains a matter of high societal concern that represents, in one way or another, a ‘Grand Challenge’ in the sense of the Lund Declaration. Reinhard Büscher Head of Unit ‘Support for Innovation’ at DG Enterprise and Industry
Results of the public consultation
www.proinno-europe.eu > Consultation > Results of the public consultation
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Sectoral Innovation Watch
Keeping an eye on the future of innovation
The Foresight exercise of the Sectoral Innovation Sectoral Innovation Watch Watch (SIW) aims to anticipate the ways in which innovation systems evolve and to apply mechanisms to support the future development of innovation policies and strategies. It brought together key-players from nine industrial sectors, in Brussels, on 23 - 24 June 2009 to analyse the dynamics and future development of sectoral systems of innovation.
The nine industries involved in the first SIW workshop 1. Aeronautics and Space 2. Biotechnology 3. Electrical and Optical Equipment 4. Knowledge-Intensive Business Services 5. Wholesale and Retail 6. Automotive 7. Construction 8. Food and Beverage 9. Textiles and Clothing
Opening this Foresight Workshop, Reinhard Büscher, Head of Unit, ‘Support for Innovation’ at DG Enterprise and Industry noted that “There is a need to use innovation as an enabler to increase jobs and to support innovation at activity level. This remains a challenge. Half of innovation is driven by research and technology. The other half is the way in which we support these at the policy level, in order to turn ideas into value.” SIW identifies key drivers, future markets and specific requirements such as skills requirements, structural changes, the possible merging of sectors, institutional changes and organisational changes at the level of firms. “Using foresight for exploring future innovation challenges and policy issues is an
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important addition to conventional studies and analyses, as in a fast-changing economy, we need to prepare for likely changes rather than react to crises once they have occurred,” explained Matthias Weber, leader of SIW Foresight. This is done by sketching out possible future scenarios, taking into account the associated challenges, underlying driving forces, and alternatives for dealing with them. “For this we need entrepreneurs to drive innovation. We need to identify who the agents of change are. Where are they? What is the role of incumbents and start-ups? The link between technologies and markets are companies. But we are not interested in technology per se but in value creation we are interested in jobs and people,” said Reinhard Büscher. The growing importance of demand-side drivers for innovation was emphasised by the participants in all of the nine sector working groups. This importance was stressed, in particular, by the two service sectors of Knowledge-Intensive Business Services and Wholesale and Retail Trade. In line with this observation, the consideration of sustainability issues is expected to become an integral part of innovation activities, but there is still a gap to be bridged in the coming years between the requirements of the demand-side and innovation in practice.
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Spotlight on the response
to the Europe INNOVA call The outcome of the last call for proposals for the Europe INNOVA initiative is now known. The projects that have been awarded grants will launch their activities in September 2009 when the Annual Partnering Event in Heraklion will give them the opportunity to discuss important innovation support issues. However, a look back at the response to the call holds some lessons for the future. The applications came from some twenty countries and the distribution of these proposals across countries is somewhat different compared to the last PRO INNO EuropeŽ call. The fact that Southern European and newer Member States are well-represented confirms both the visibility of the initiative and the relevance of its proposed activities to all of Europe. The response differed across the themes, with most applications being submitted for the KIS-IP1. Whilst there may have been certain doubts about the significance of services innovation, this response should lay those concerns to rest, especially as the country pattern demonstrates an interest across the whole of Europe. Fewer applications than expected were received for the Cluster-IP2 and the Eco-IP3. The notion of a ‘cluster organisation’ seems to have caused many a headache for applicants and some awareness-raising activities may be necessary to promote greater understanding of these organisations outside the field of research. The low number of proposals for the Eco-IP3 seems to be due to the fragmentation of the eco-innovation support community and the scarcity of dedicated support programmes and eventually, parts of the Eco-IP call were re-published.
The future is green and paid for by vouchers The most common support services across all the European Innovation Platforms concern web-based information systems on knowledge and sources of finance together with training in business skills, notably in finance. This highlights the high cost of searching for market-specific information sources and the persistent lack of training in entrepreneurial management. Experimenting with voucher schemes to deliver support services, most notably training, has proved to be much more popular than expected, as each project has such a scheme, and these cover a diverse range of design variants. This indicates a widespread expectation that vouchers can provide an appropriate response to the acknowledged ineffectiveness of existing services. Many applicants justified the need for improved support services by pointing out the high administration cost of service delivery. Against this backdrop, the Staff Working Document* of the European Commission on the effectiveness of innovation support makes for an even more interesting read. Looking at the market areas targeted by the support services, it is striking to see that proposals dealing with an eco-innovation theme were also submitted for the KIS-IP and the Cluster-IP. If there is a single common thread that runs through the Europe INNOVA initiative, it is eco-innovation. Readers will be able to check if this theme figures prominently enough in the planned Communications of the European Commission on the ETAP review and on the Innovation Plan for the coming years, both of which are expected to appear this autumn.
1. KIS-IP
European Innovation Platform on Knowledge-Intensive Services
2. Cluster-IP
European Innovation Platform for Clusters
3. Eco-IP
European Eco-Innovation Platform
Number of applicants per country
*
A Commission staff working document differs from a Communication in that it does not imply a political message or commitment endorsed by the college of commissioners. See the news on www.europe-innova.eu
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Cluster Cooperation
Cluster Cooperation Binding international ties
There is an increasing recognition of the need for more effective transnational cooperation between cluster organisations as a new way of providing targeted, customer-oriented business support. The European Innovation Platform for Clusters (Cluster-IP) facilitates such effective transnational cooperation between cluster organisations and modernises cluster support services with the overall objective of creating more world-class clusters. The platform aims to integrate more innovative SMEs into clusters and also to raise their international profiles. It builds on the belief that identifying strong potential partners and building trust is crucial for effective transnational cooperation.
The experience of the 11 cluster networks in the previous phase of Europe INNOVA has shown that this process takes time, but that it can produce positive and creative linkages once trust is established. The Cluster-IP comprises two cluster partnerships in different market areas linked to the Lead Market Initiative and to the complementary horizontal information from the European Cluster Observatory on what clusters can offer. To increase the real impact, a more targeted approach has been applied to the new phase with a move from the facilitation of networking to true partnerships. It will focus on the development and testing of new or better support for the internationalisation of innovative SMEs.
EcoCluP
Eco-innovative cluster partnership for growth and internationalisation
Gareth Jones Project Manager, UK Centre for Economic and Environmental Development, UK
Cluster Cooperation EcoCluP
“EcoCluP is the first pan-European partnership of cluster organisations focusing on the eco-innovative industries that aims to adapt, test and implement sector-specific cluster support tools and services for fast-growing businesses in the sector.� This pan-European partnership brings together cluster organisations focusing on eco-innovative industries including waste, water, remediation, pollution control, environmental services, energy, sustainable transport and construction. EcoCluP aims to support over 1200 companies in their pursuit of growth and internationalisation and, overall, to involve more than 2000 companies and other stakeholders. It will offer its support to the 3500 cluster companies and 430 research institutions associated
with the participating clusters through training courses, match-making events, leveraging the use of self-assessment tools and voucher schemes. In addition, EcoCluP will map the demand and supply together with opportunities to cooperate in exploiting the joint research capacity. The partnership will also reach out to other cluster organisations as, for example, it will invite them to join the Eco-Cluster Manager Campus, once the project has developed a support toolbox.
g.jones@ukceed.org | www.europe-innova.eu/ecoclup
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ABCEurope
Advanced Biotech Cluster platform for Europe
Attilio Martinetti Director of Innovhub, Special Agency for Innovation Chamber of Commerce of Milan, Italy
Cluster Cooperation ABCEurope
“ABCEurope brings together 14 of Europe’s strongest biotechnology clusters in a unique partnership with the overall objective of raising the standard of services to biotech SMEs and defragmenting the delivery of such services to SMEs across Europe.” ABCEurope aims to contribute to the establishment of more world-class clusters in the biotechnology sector. A minimum of 750 biotechnology SMEs will be directly involved through training, intensive and focused meetings of entrepreneurs, tech showcases, IPR support for internationalisation and the provision of supported office space at PartnerPorts for business expansions. ABCEurope will further develop and test a mutual cluster ambassador scheme that offers a
promising tool to intensify linkages between clusters and their firms. It also aims to deliver recommended draft IPR agreements and develop a gold standard for benchmarking the provision of internationalisation support services with related training modules. It will also offer guidelines and reports on shared access to facilities and challenges in terms of the exploitation of the joint research capacity.
martinetti@mi.camcom.it | www.europe-innova.eu/abceurope
European Cluster Observatory Örjan Sölvell Professor, Center for Strategy and Competitiveness Stockholm School of Economics, Sweden
European Cluster Observatory
“By establishing the European Cluster Observatory, DG Enterprise and Industry has taken an essential step in providing fact-driven policy in the areas of innovation, industry, regions and clusters.” The European Cluster Observatory, which in its second phase will move beyond cluster mapping towards a fully-fledged information service for enterprises and cluster organisations on what clusters can offer, will provide further horizontal support for the partnering of cluster organisations. The Observatory will not only enable clusters and cluster organisations to be identified and located but also facilitate transnational cooperation between cluster firms and cluster organisations through collaboration platforms.
The current statistical cluster mapping will also undergo a revision including the addition of data about clusters and their business environments. In its first phase, the European Cluster Observatory mapped clusters in 38 sectors across 32 countries based on employment data. The outcomes of the changes to the Observatory will be the addition of user-friendly collaboration platforms and enriched information about clusters, as well as more refined cluster mapping together with reports addressing, in particular, the emergence of clusters in new industries.
orjan.solvell@hhs.se | www.europe-innova.eu/eu-cluster-obs
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Innovation in Services
Knowledge-Intensive Services An innovative service sector
The European Innovation Platform on Knowledge-Intensive Services (KIS-IP) addresses the specific needs of innovative companies in the service sector. The second phase of the KIS-IP builds upon the structure established during the initial phase and adds new partnerships in four different sectors.
MOBIP
Mobile Services Innovation Platform
Mr Angelos Manglis President and Managing Director, Atlantis Consulting S.A., Greece
Innovation in Services MOBIP
“Mobile services have a huge economic potential for competitiveness, innovation and growth, and there is a strong need to build on this potential in the world markets.” MOBIP is seeking to identify and address the needs of high growth ventures that are active in mobile services. The overall goal is to support their competitiveness and help them to achieve their high growth potential. A further key objective is to facilitate their search
for investors. This includes identifying models for investment readiness and investor attractiveness of mobile services businesses both in relation to national sources of finance and cross-border investment.
amanglis@atlantisresearch.gr | www.europe-innova.eu/mobip
B Creative
Business kit for Creative start-ups in Intellectual Property Rights (IPR), Venture capital and Entrepreneurial skills
João Mena de Matos Director, European Design Centre, Netherlands Innovation in Services B Creative
“Creative industries are deeply linked with innovation, which is the core of Europe’s economic strength. B Creative will help foster the most promising start-ups in this strategic economic field by providing them with the right tools for growth and success.” B Creative addresses the needs of SMEs within the creative industries. The main objective for this project is to streamline different innovation support mechanisms for SMEs with a view to establishing closer links between knowledge creation, incubation, finance and
clusters. By removing existing barriers, it will encourage SMEs to better exploit their research results and facilitate the search for investors and potential business partners. Ten partners from six European countries will participate in the project.
jmm@edc.nl | www.europe-innova.eu/bcreative
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GreenConServe
Greening the Construction Sector – Towards a Value-adding Service Industry
Katharina Krell Managing Director, Greenovate! Europe EEIG, Belgium
Innovation in Services GreenConServe
“GreenConServe will be instrumental in accelerating the paradigm shift of the largest European sector towards a green services industry. The project involves exciting and genuine European cooperation between the EU, the national innovation agencies, innovation professionals and the business community. It offers companies all the innovation support they need from one and the same hand.” GreenConServe sets out to improve the innovation support framework for green service innovators in the construction sector. The project will design, test and implement a two-step voucher scheme providing access to technical and business support for service innovators in the construction industry in Norway, France and
Germany. It involves a public-private partnership with professional associations organising training and national innovation agencies providing public funding for the vouchers. The intended long-term impact is the development of a truly European market for comprehensive innovation support services.
katharina.krell@greenovate.eu | www.europe-innova.eu/greenconserve
ImMediaTe
Improving the value of Digital Media and Creative Industries through Innovative Business Models and Services
Michela Michilli Head of “EU Programmes & International Initiatives” Unit Filas, Italy
Innovation in Services ImMediaTe
“ImMediaTe will unlock the potential of creative and innovative SMEs by establishing a sectoral platform with a balanced mix of knowledge transfer, learning processes, investment attraction and collaboration within clusters.” ImMediaTe’s objective is to counteract the high market fragmentation within the digital media and creative sector, one of the fastest growing market segments with an annual turnover of 300 billion euro. The project will assist new ventures in finding and attracting public and private investment, with special attention being paid to international co-financing schemes. ImMediaTe will tackle the fragmentation of the sector value chain
by bringing together all relevant key stakeholders from the entrepreneurial and investment sides and supporting them with facilitators such as regional development agencies and clusters. The project will launch a new European enterprise equipped to create, deliver and maintain an integrated and standardised package of services including finance, education and business support to SMEs in the digital media sector.
michilli@filas.it | www.europe-innova.eu/immediate
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Eco-Innovation Eco-Innovation
Supporting a major policy objective
The European Eco-Innovation Platform (Eco-IP) aims to help users adopt eco-innovative solutions. The innovation support services that it will test will be designed for those SMEs which are active in the emerging eco-innovation markets identified by the Lead Market Initiative and the Environmental Technology Action Plan (ETAP). The Eco-IP consists of partnerships in three different eco-innovation market areas that are complemented by two horizontal actions, which aim to structure the eco-innovation community and establish an Eco-innovation Observatory.
REMake
Recycling and Resource Efficiency driving innovation in European Manufacturing SMEs Dr. Uwe König CTO - Technical Director, Zentralverband Oberflächentechnik e.V. Association of German Surface Technology Federations, Germany
Eco-Innovation REMake
“The European manufacturing industry is about to undertake a tremendous effort towards a major paradigm shift - to break the old link between growth and resource consumption.” REMake is concerned with innovation support for the lead market area of recycling and resource efficiency (RRE). The core of its activities will be the testing of a comprehensive set of consultancy tools by means of a two-stage voucher scheme. These tools will be developed for, and tested with, manufacturing SMEs that produce or apply RRE technologies.The project’s six national and regional agencies and seven technical
centres and consultants plan to test a self-assessment tool on RRE innovation performance, as well as training and consultancy modules on RRE-oriented eco-design, life-cycle assessment and eco-innovation management. The search for a competitive advantage through an early adoption of eco-innovation standards and labels in the RRE field will be supported by a new database information system.
u.koenig@zvo.org | www.europe-innova.eu/remake
The Eco-Innovation Observatory Michal Miedzinski Senior Consultant, Technopolis Group, Belgium Eco-Innovation Observatory
“Eco-Innovation offers a huge potential of new markets for EU companies as well as a promise of more sustainable business and lifestyles. The Eco-Innovation Observatory will be the first integrated European-level knowledge source on eco-innovation for enterprises, innovation service providers and policy-makers alike.“ The Eco-Innovation Observatory, an action anticipated in the Environmental Technology Action Plan for 20042009, will be a strategic knowledge resource on ecoinnovation for businesses and policy-makers. The main objectives of the observatory are to gather market intelligence on eco-innovation, analyse technology trends, provide sector analysis and measure eco-innovation in the Member States. The observatory will liaise with other EU
initiatives working in related fields, in particular, ETAP and the Lead Market Initiative. Its main output will be an annual report on the state of eco-innovation and eco-industries in the EU and an on-line information tool for businesses and policy-makers. The aim is to offer a complete service in support of businesses and SMEs by providing them with the latest market insights, which can be used to spot and exploit market opportunities and trends.
michal.miedzinski@technopolis-group.com | www.europe-innova.eu/eco-inno-obs Two further partnerships in specific market areas and an action to strengthen the ties between the Eco-IP and the eco-innovation actors across Europe begin this autumn and will be described in detail in the December 2009 issue of Sparks.
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Novel Tools and Services Novel Tools & Services TAKE IT UP
Promoting better practices
The Europe INNOVA promotion pillar is a completely new measure. It aims to improve the exploitation of the results achieved by the initiative’s pilot actions and to raise the impact of EU-funded innovation projects.
TAKE IT UP Andrea Di Anselmo Vice President, META Group, Italy Novel Tools & Services TAKE IT UP
“Such a challenge is even more crucial in the current crisis, as the capability to leverage innovation and novel services represents a key response to bridge with the future.” It will leverage access by granting direct entry to innovative business practices that can be replicated by innovation support providers. These practices will have undergone a process of assessment and improvement and will have been reshaped to ensure their better and wider use. The project will provide a repository of these
practical approaches and they will be disseminated and promoted to target users. There will also be on-line tools and services to prepare for take-up, specialist counselling to acquire the know-how and skills needed to operate the new tools and services, as well as user feedback mechanisms to promote continuous improvements.
a.dianselmo@meta-group.com | www.europe-innova.eu/takeitup
New Europe INNOVA web portal Register now and benefit from
User friendly Interface Open forums Chat functionality RSS feeds Advanced search tool Personal webpage (*) Collaborative workspace (*)
* Available for members of Europe INNOVA projects and partnerships
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With its call for proposals in 2009, PRO INNO EuropeÂŽ is starting its second generation. This initiative promotes innovation policy analysis and cooperation in Europe, with a view to learning from the best examples and contributing to the development of new and better innovation policies in Europe.
The specific priority areas of PRO INNO EuropeÂŽ are clusters, eco-innovation and services. There are six actions or projects that have been selected in this call. They all have different orientations but share the overall objective of fostering transnational cooperation and supporting policy -makers to identify, explore and test new and promising trends in their respective fields.
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INNO-Partnering Forum: This INNO-Net will improve innovation support services in Europe by bringing together six national Innovation Agencies to extend the quality, efficiency and effectiveness of SME innovation support. These agencies will establish a mutual learning platform and draft policy recommendations on how innovation agencies can act together to develop transnational support systems for innovative SMEs.
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Transnational Alliance of Clusters towards Improved Cooperation Support: This INNO-Net is the continuation of the European Cluster Alliance. It will assemble seven of Europe’s leading national and regional innovation and cluster policy organisations with the clear objective of disseminating and promoting improved cluster policies to a wider audience.
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European Policies and Instruments to Support Innovation in Services: The main objective of this INNO-Net is to facilitate transnational cooperation between innovation policy makers and it will be implemented by a consortium of leading national public authorities. Its aim is to advance broad-based innovation policy and induce a
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change in mind-sets so that services and services innovation are recognised as a major economic force in Europe.
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Better Policies and Instruments in Support of Eco-Innovation: This INNO-Net will increase the understanding of eco-innovation dynamics and the role of public policies and it will also identify best practices in the participating countries. Promising policy areas are green public procurement, policies supporting innovative waste and recycling management and international cooperation in diffusing environmental technologies. The project will be managed by DG Environment but as there were no eligible applications, the call for proposals will be re-published this autumn.
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European Innovation Weeks: As its name suggests, this INNO-Action will bring innovation closer to the citizens of Europe. Two of these weeks will also include a European Design Management Award Presentation Ceremony. The project has a total of seven partners coming from different regions within the EU.
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European Cluster Management Excellence: This INNO-Action will unite the most experienced people and organisations in Europe in a common task of developing best quality indicators for cluster management, transforming these into guidelines for improving cluster organisations and, finally, providing training and materials to support the process. It will also be a springboard to launch a quality label for cluster management.
Sweden proposes a debate
on a European Innovation Plan
It began with a common market for coal and steel amidst high hopes of avoiding another war in Europe. Then it became a common market for agriculture and fish, followed by the internal market with common legislation for goods and services. Now, the aim is to create a common market for researchers, research and innovation. This development is outlined in the Lisbon Treaty and the Swedish Presidency is keen to launch the European Research Area or ERA. The concrete work in the form of a European Innovation Plan is highlighted in the working programme of the Swedish Presidency and ERA is expected to materialise under the Spanish and Belgian presidencies, in 2010. The particular focus of the Swedish Minister for Higher Education and Research, Tobias Krantz, is on strengthening the so-called knowledge triangle that involves cooperation between education, research and innovation to make the European research area more effective and transparent. The Minister feels very strongly that “Member States, the Commission, universities, research institutions, industry and other stakeholders must work together in a carefully considered manner for the vision to be realised.”
The Swedes have detailed their contribution in the ‘Lund Declaration’ that was adopted at a conference of 350 researchers, policy makers and representatives from industry and research funding institutions held in Lund, the university town in southern Sweden, on 6 - 8 July. The key messages of the Lund manifesto are to identify what are called the ‘Grand Challenges’ and to find “sustainable solutions in areas such as global warming, tightening supplies of energy, water and food, ageing societies, public health, pandemics and security.” According to the Swedes, the declaration is also a step forward in the preparations for the EU’s next multiannual research programme. Along with a mid-term review of the current EU innovation policies, the Swedish Presidency plans to hold a first policy debate during the Competiveness Council Meeting, in September, with a view to formulating concrete input to the new strategy, at the December Competitiveness Council. The Swedish Presidency will also open the door to the future by holding a conference on ‘An Eco-efficient Economy – Towards Innovative and Sustainable Competitiveness,’ in Linköping, on 2-3 November 2009.
1. The Lund Declaration
www.se2009.eu > Meetings & News > 08 July > Declaration from the Research Conference in Lund > The Lund Declaration
2. Work programme for the Swedish Presidency of the EU, 1 July - 31 December 2009
www.se2009.eu > The Presidency > Other prioritised issues during the Presidency > Work programme for the Swedish Presidency of the EU
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The News in Brief More ambition needed to speed up the drive for innovation Partnerships for better innovation support Europe INNOVA is an initiative of the European Commission’s Directorate General Enterprise and Industry which aspires to become the laboratory for the development and testing of new tools and instruments in support of innovation with a view to help innovative enterprises innovate faster and better. It brings together public and private innovation support providers such as innovation agencies, technology transfer offices, business incubators, financing intermediaries, cluster organisations and others. The newsletter of the Europe INNOVA initiative © European Commission - Reproduction is authorised, provided the source is acknowledged. To subscribe: www.europe-innova.eu/newsletter Editorial contact: newsletter@europe-innova.eu Published by: Sparks and all other elements of the Europe INNOVA communications project are performed by a consortium of companies headed by Logotech SA (Greece). Legal notice: This publication has been produced as part of the Europe INNOVA initiative. The views expressed in this report, as well as the information included in it, do not necessarily reflect the opinion or position of the European Commission and in no way commit the institution. This newsletter is financed under the Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme (CIP) which aims to encourage the competitiveness of European enterprises.
An assessment presented by the European Commission has concluded that Europe has made remarkable progress in developing policies in support of innovation. For example, a significant shift has taken place in Cohesion Policy to promote research and innovation at regional level. Also, the European Institute of Innovation and Technology has been established in Budapest and this institute combines research and education with business innovation. Commission Vice-President Günter Verheugen, responsible for enterprise and industry policy, is convinced that “We need to stay firm in our commitment to invest in research and innovation to emerge stronger out of the current crisis.” He also indicated that innovation was the key to developing a low carbon economy and called for an even more ambitious innovation plan for Europe. However, the absence of a Community patent, financial bottlenecks and weaknesses in venture capital markets continue to hinder investment in innovation.
Future EU Innovation Policy
http://ec.europa.eu > European Commission > EU policies > Enterprise > Enterprise policies > Innovation > Innovation policy > Future EU Innovation Policy
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Based on the analysis of achievements so far and the lessons learned the Commission will explore with Member States and stakeholders the feasibility of proposing a European innovation act aiming at strengthening the partnership approach in innovation as an integral part of the future European reform agenda beyond 2010.
COMING EVENTS:
> 12-16 October 2009, Jyväskylä, Finland
The 12th Annual Global Conference of The Competitiveness Institute (TCI): ‘Learning Clusters - adapting to the new competitiveness scenario’
A very international group of competitiveness and innovation developers and practitioners will aim to create new solutions to enhance the competitiveness of businesses, regions and clusters. Loose networks or paperwork-heavy funding programmes are no longer enough to support businesses. Instead, there is a need for true learning networks, a shift in mindsets and visionary leadership!
More information at:
www.clusters2009.com
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> 2 - 3 November 2009, Linköping, Sweden
Swedish EU Presidency High-level Conference on an Eco-Efficient Economy ‘Towards Innovative and Sustainable Competitiveness’ This conference offers a unique opportunity to discuss and demonstrate how policy, new business models, eco-innovation and energy and resource efficiency can drive sustainable European competitiveness and stimulate the creation of jobs and businesses.
More information at::
www.se2009.eu > Meetings & news > 2 November 2009 > Eco-Efficient - Towards Innovative and Sustainable Competitiveness
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The official invitation, programme and information about registration will be available in September.
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European Commission Enterprise and Industry