The EU's research and innovation strategy published today plans to turn Europe into an ‘Innovation Union’ by 2020.

 The EU's innovation strategy called the European Commission's " Innovation Union"  has been presented today. It sets out a strategic approach to innovation.

This Europe 2020 flagship will boost Europe’s research and innovation performance by speeding up the process from ideas to markets.

The Commission proposes a series of actions to put innovation at the heart of EU economy and society for the benefit of companies and citizens. The new "Innovation partnerships" is expected to generate breakthroughs in areas of concern for the citizens such as climate change, energy efficiency and healthy living. The success will depend on the commitment of all actors involved in innovation cycle.

The choice of Healthier Ageing as the first issue to be addressed within the Innovation Partnerships is a
great challenge for all actors in the innovation chain and specifically in healthcare.

Amongst the other measures set out in the Commission’s proposal, we note provisions to
avoid internal market fragmentation, eliminate restrictive interpretation of State Aid for SMEs and to
improve more general access to finance for those SMEs. Indeed, whilst there is growing recognition that
biotech SMEs are important drivers of innovation within the EU, there is still difficulty for SMEs to obtain finance to invest in research and product development and buid sustainable innovation path that leads to the delivery of the innovative products and services.

More info:

Innovation union web-site (with main info):
http://ec.europa.eu/research/innovation-union/

Innovation union facebook page:
http://www.facebook.com/innovation.union

Innovation unlimited blog:
http://blogs.ec.europa.eu/innovationunlimited/

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Further info at : http://www.euractiv.com/en/enterprise-jobs/governments-seek-help-innovative-smes-news-497086