MEPs set to remedy EU's innovation Achilles' heel

Europe needs to capitalise on its top research centres, universities and dynamic and innovative businesses by embracing the concept of the EIT say two of parliament's senior MEPs.

Writing in the Parliament Magazine’s quarterly Research Review, German ALDE mep Jorgo Chatzimarkakis said that the EIT would “explore new cooperation models in the triangle of science, education and industry that do not exist up to now in Europe”.

“Europe has top research centres and universities, dynamic companies and innovative SMEs and yet in comparison with other world-regions, and especially the United States, we do not turn our research results into marketable products as much as others do,” he said.

“No current initiatives can help put Europe back on the world’s research and innovation map, the EIT can.

“It can become a flagship for excellence and the EU needs such a flagship.”

MEPs are expected to adopt the second reading report on the European institute of innovation and technology (EIT) in the March plenary in Strasbourg.

Reino Paasilinna, the Finnish rapporteur for the EIT, accepted that the concept of a European super-university, a sort of a ‘European MIT’, was now gone, and stressed that the emphasis must now be on innovation.

“There is a very simple reason why; the EU is not very good at it,” he told the Research Review.

“We produce some of the best research in the world, but often do not know how to capitalise on our knowledge. Lack of innovations is the EU's Achilles' heel and that is why my report on the EIT emphasises the role of innovations.”

He said that the EIT would have a light network structure instead of a central campus. A small administration will be based in one site, but the actual operation of the EIT will be carried out by autonomous knowledge and innovation communities (KICs).

The idea is to have the first KICs operational by 2010.

The south western Polish city of Wroclaw is a candidate to become the headquarters, or at least coordinator, of one of the KICs.

“We posed our candidature two years ago following the commission’s original proposal,” says Andrzej Los, marshal of Lower Silesia.

“We see the EIT project as an opportunity to achieve rapid progress and boost our economic infrastructure.

“Even though this is one of the most developed Polish regions, it is still not equivalent to other European regions such as Flanders, Isle de France or, say, some regions of the UK. So this is a means of making our region competitive, and to reinforce our R&D and technology sectors. It’s an opportunity to improve our situation.”

The council's common position on establishing the EIT was officially approved in February by parliament’s industry committee.

The commission-appointed identification committee will now nominate 18 experts for the EIT's first governing board, and the European council will then take a decision on where the EIT's governing body will be located.

“The parliament, council and commission have done their best to set up an institute, innovative in both form and content that can help bridge the gap between research and innovation in Europe and to prevent it turning into a bureaucratic white elephant, dominated by politics rather than by R&D,” said Chatzimarkakis.

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