By Daisy Ayliffe - 22nd February 2006
The European commission unveiled plans for a European Institute of Technology on Wednesday – as part of the renewed Lisbon strategy for jobs and growth.
Outlining plans for a new flagship institute for excellence in research, education commissioner Jan Figel said the key to unlocking the project would lie in attracting private investment.
“The EIT will run on funds from the EU, member states and especially from business,” Figel explained.
“This is an EU weakness – we have a lack of business engagement.”
US giant Microsoft is said to have expressed an interest in the European ambition and European Commission President José Manuel Barroso insisted other companies would do the same.
“Our aim is to have as many partners on side as possible. Our national systems are limited to the rules of public services. We want to create a system free from this pressure – an institution with a European mission. That will be progress,” he declared.
Barroso believes the EIT will help fuel Europe’s R&D agenda and could soon become a rival to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
“Europe’s problem is its deficit in science, research and innovation. We are lagging behind the USA.”
“It is a common perception that in Europe, this relationship does not work as well as it could. Europe consistently falls short in turning R&D results into commercial opportunities, innovations and jobs,” Figel added.
A draft proposal for the project suggested a budget of up to €2bn for the years 2010-13, some of which would come from public sources.
Barroso set out plans to create a body based on two levels. A small central core would set priorities and hand out degrees while numerous “knowledge communities” at universities all over Europe would pull together Europe-wide research teams.
“This is not just about creating a new body. It is about creating an institution that will serve as a bench mark to upgrade the status of institutions across Europe. This is about taking research centres above their national perspective and giving them a European mission,” Barroso beamed.
"Excellence needs flagships: that is why Europe must have a strong European Institute of Technology, bringing together the best brains and companies and disseminating the results throughout Europe."
The main areas of research will be energy and the environment, IT and nanotechnology, the commission president added.
But the idea has been criticised by Europe’s top universities.
Last week Lord Patten, the former EU commissioner and chancellor of Oxford University, said Brussels should channel more funds into existing institutions.
“Europe already has one or two institutions which do as well as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and many more of which would be able to do so if they were better funded.”
European universities fear the project will pull public money away from existing research.
And as Barosso assured journalists he was confident of the European parliament's backing, conservative MEPs confided that they were questioning how viable the scheme would prove to be.
"No doubt it is a fine aspiration to replicate the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Europe but is it just another example of hopelessly ambitious unrealistic European ambitions, the triumph of hope over experience?" Giles Chichester MEP and conservative industry spokesman asked.
"Several key issues arise. Will this proposal divert effort and resources from all the existing technology centres and damage European research and development? Why not build on what we have rather than try to re-invent the wheel?"
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