- “Europe has excellent science, but we lack disruptive market-creating innovation. This is what is needed to turn our best ideas into new jobs, businesses and opportunities.”
European innovators often come up with great ideas, but new technologies that are developed in Europe too often are commercialised elsewhere. As research and innovation create investment opportunities for new and better products and services it also increase competitiveness and employment. That is why one of the priorities of the EU is to get Europe better at making the most of its innovation talent which can only succeed when Open Innovation is the first goal.
- “We need Open Innovation to capitalise on the results of European research and innovation. This means creating the right ecosystems, increasing investment, and bringing more companies and regions into the knowledge economy. I would like to go further and faster towards Open Innovation.”
(Commissioner Carlos Moedas “A new start for Europe: Opening up to an ERA of Innovation”, Conference Brussels, 22 June 2015)
OI therefore is a core priority for the European Commission policy in the field of science and innovation. In his speech at the Forum Alpbach 2016 Robert-Jan Smits, Director-General for Research and Innovation of the EC, states the most important reasons why OI is indispensable:
- the enormous mass of data (Big Data) which is available for companies and the digital technologies with which this data can be read – this demands collaboration
- for the globalisation of the science community that makes it easier to transfer know-how
- for the society that on one hand requires more concrete solutions and on the other hand wishes to know its benefits in the money invested in research
- the problems science is working on has become more complex which requires collaboration and openness
Only by that it is possible to substantially increase the competitiveness of individual member states and of Europe at large.
