Ref. Ares(2019)5332022 - 21/08/2019
Table of Contents
1. STEERING BRIEF
4
1.1 Scene setter
4
2. SPEAKING POINTS
5
3. DEFENSIVE POINTS
8
3.1 Open innovation platforms and Open Innovation Strategy and policy Groups
10
3.2 European Innovation Council
11
3.3 DSM Cloud Initiative
12
4. CURRICULUM VITAE
11
5. BACKGROUND INFORMATION
12
5.1 Open innovation platforms
12
5.2 The Open Innovation Strategy and Policy Group
12
5.3 European Open Science Cloud
13
5.4 European Innovation Council
13
5.5 ICT Standardisation Priorities for the Digital Single Market
15
6. FACTS AND FIGURES
16
6.1 Intel Facts and figures
16
7. SOCIAL MEDIA
17
2/17
KEY MESSAGES
• Your work with DG CNECT in the context of the EU's Open Innovation
Strategy and Policy Group is impressive and very relevant for my agenda.
It is a good basis for working together better in the future, notably to
advance my "Open Innovation" priority.
• In the context of the Digital Single Market, the European Open Science
Cloud is an initiative that responds to the needs of Data Driven Science
and expectations of the scientific community.
• Intel, as an important global player in cloud computing and IoT,
participates in many Horizon 2020 projects. I hope you will consider
future calls for proposals and funding opportunities, including through
public private partnerships.
• Supporting the merge of digital and physical worlds will be a strong
orientation in future Horizon 2020 work programmes. What are
expectations of Intel in this regard?
• Europe does excellent science, but we need to do more to support
disruptive, market-creating innovation, which is essential for turning our
best ideas into new jobs, businesses and market opportunities. So I am
exploring whether we can put in place, via a European Innovation Council
(EIC), an improved support mechanism for Europe's top innovators.
Preparatory steps in the form of a pilot EIC could be put forward in the
context of the mid-term review of Horizon 2020.
KEY FIGURES
FP7
Horizon 2020
Total number of participations
59
29
Total number of signed grant
59
29
agreements
Marie Sklodowska-Curie –
2
1
Number of grantees
EU total financial contribution to
€15.25m
€12.52m
participation
3/17
2. SPEAKING POINTS
Open Innovation Platforms, Open Innovation Strategy and Policy Group
• Open innovation platforms and hubs will play a crucial role in building a
European wide innovation ecosystem. It is important that public R&I
policies are geared towards providing support for creating such regional and
local innovation ecosystems.
• I am interested to hear your views on these platforms and your experience
from the Open Innovation Strategy and Policy Group.
DSM
• As we are moving from a global economy to a global digital economy most
innovations will be enabled by digitalisation. Common standards for digital
technologies are the foundations of an effective Digital Single Market. We
need to speed up the current standard setting pace in Europe and the creation
of common open standards. Horizon 2020 funds will have an important role
in supporting this goal.
• As you know, the Commission sent a clear political signal in this domain
through its ICT Standardisation Communication adopted on 19 April (as part
of the DSM technology package). We welcome the involvement of Intel in
standard setting in areas such as cloud computing and IoT.
European Open Science Cloud
• Another important component of the DSM technology package adopted last
month is the European Open Science Cloud, which will provide the whole
range of services necessary for scientific activities in the digital age ('data-
driven science'), from easy data storage and retrieval to advanced data
analytics and high-performance computing.
5/17
• Industry is expected to contribute to the development of the underlying
European Data Infrastructure (integrating data centres, communication
networks and computing facilities) and data analytics solutions.
• The upcoming Horizon 2020 calls related to the Science Cloud are
INFRADEV-04-2016 (closing in June 2016) and EINFRA-12-2017
(opening Dec 2016). More support should be provided in the next work
programmes of Horizon 2020 (2018-2020). I trust Intel will keep a close
watch on these developments and funding opportunities.
Horizon 2020 and Intel
• Horizon 2020 has proven very attractive so far, with 92,000 full submitted
proposals to date, for a total requested funding of € 289 billion of EU
contribution. I congratulate Intel on its current record of 29 participations for
the total sum of €12.52 million.
• Merging the digital and physical worlds will be a strong orientation in future
Horizon 2020 work programmes. The application of digital technologies in
all areas of life offers huge opportunities for generating additional growth,
thereby creating hundreds of thousands of new jobs, and addressing societal
challenges. What are expectations of Intel in this regard?
European Innovation Council
• Europe does not yet have a world class scheme to support the best
innovations; to address this we are working on establishing a European
Innovation Council in the context of the mid-term review of Horizon 2020.
• I envisage making proposals following our 'call for ideas', for which we
received an impressive number of responses- more than 1000 in total -
including many position papers.
• Our analysis of the responses points at a widespread view that we need to do
more in Europe to foster disruptive (breakthrough) innovation, take further
6/17
steps to cut red tape, especially in SME-targeted programmes, help more
young high growth innovative firms to scale up and improve framework
conditions for R&I in Europe.
• I am curious about your views on this and would welcome your advice in
view of providing the most effective support to innovators.
7/17
3. DEFENSIVE POINTS
3.1 Open Innovation Platforms and Open Innovation Strategy and Policy Group
Open Innovation Strategy and Policy Group has worked on Open Innovation issues for
many years with DG CONNECT – how does this work link up to your work, especially
under the "Open Innovation" priority?
I am aware of and I acknowledge the great work carried out by OISPG with DG CONNECT.
We are open to discuss potential ways for us to learn from this cooperation and work together
on this topic. Under my mandate, I have identified three main objectives under the "Open
Innovation" priority: boosting private investment (including use of EFSI, financial
instruments and support for the VC sector), maximizing impact (most importantly through
European Innovation Council and Policy Support Facility) and pursuing regulatory reforms
(most importantly through InnovREFIT and Innovation Deals). All these measures facilitate
the emergence of better framework conditions for innovation, conducive to Open Innovation.
I am open to discuss some more specific ways to bring about the open innovation model that
you may be familiar with.
Are you involved in any initiatives supporting Open Innovation platforms, including in
Horizon 2020?
The importance of open innovation platforms for building innovation ecosystems is
acknowledged in the community and accepted by ourselves. Numerous initiatives have been
tested to find the most effective model for stimulating this type of cooperation on EU level –
we have established European Innovation Partnerships and sectoral Joint Undertakings, with
the intention that they can serve that role. The EIT KICs are another model implementing this
principle. Based on the experiences gathered through these experiences we will try to find the
best model to support open, collaborative innovation. If you have any further ideas on this we
would be very happy to learn from you.
Intel and Horizon 2020
How is the EU supporting industrial competitiveness and innovation?
Research and Innovation is one of the key investment sectors under Commission President
Juncker's European Fund for Strategic Investments. Horizon 2020 will devote nearly €80
billion over the 2014-2020 period (an increase of 30% over FP7). A similar amount will be
available through the Structural and Investment Funds.
Horizon 2020 is much more focused than in the past on getting ideas from the lab to market.
In addition, the Commission identifies the barriers to innovation and address them by
appropriate policy measures and instruments (e.g. public-private partnerships, standards,
innovation procurement).
What instruments are available in Horizon 2020 for Cloud services with industry?
In particular, the contractual public-private partnerships (cPPPs) established under Horizon
2020 provide an excellent platform for research collaboration with industry. There are cPPPs
directly targeting the digital value chain, such as the High-Performance Computing, which
focus on capacity building and enabling Cloud infrastructure in Europe. Other cPPPs reflect
8/17
the industrial users of Cloud services, such as the Factories of the Future, which develops
high value added manufacturing where digital interfaces, and real-time control and analysis
are directly dependent on Cloud technologies.
3.2 European Innovation Council
Do your ambitions to create a European Innovation Council mean that the current
schemes are not working?
We have made significant progress in integrating innovation into the Horizon 2020
programme. But there is scope to further improve our offer to Europe's top innovators, to
make it more visible, more accessible and is fit for purpose for different types of innovation –
tech and non-tech; incremental improvements and radical breakthroughs. One specific area
we think we could improve is the support for disruptive (breakthrough) innovations that have
the potential to create new markets, safeguard our future prosperity and secure new jobs.
Why so much focus on disruptive innovation?
Europe is relatively strong in incremental innovation and in implementing strategic research
agendas. It is important for competitiveness and we do a good job in supporting it through
Horizon 2020. But we need to raise our game in disruptive, market-creating innovations
which will be vital for future prosperity, growth and new jobs. The leading companies of
today's digital economy – Google, Apple, Facebook and Amazon (GAFA) – all resulted from
this game-changing type of innovation. Such innovations will become even more important
as digitisation lowers entry barriers to traditional sectors (transport, health, food, energy etc),
enables disruption to existing business models (taxi services, room rentals); and puts users in
the driving seat. Europe, with its strengths in traditional sectors and diversity of users, must
do better in this next wave. It should be stressed that an EIC will in no way undermine the
Commission's broad-based innovation policy. What we need are the right framework
conditions and instruments to support all forms of innovation.
What is the timetable?
Discussions with Parliament/ITRE Committee and Council are foreseen during summer 2016.
Preparatory work on the EIC will form a major element of the interim evaluation of Horizon
2020, and it is hoped to test elements of an EIC in the 2018-20 Work Programme of Horizon
2020 (i.e. using the existing legal framework). A fully-fledged EIC would likely need to form
part of the legislative proposals for the successor programme.
What might an EIC 'pilot' look like?
It is too early to go into specifics. Nonetheless different scenarios could be envisaged,
possibly in combination, for example the enhancement of key instruments (e.g. SME
instrument and FET Open) with respect to fostering disruptive innovation, improved
administrative procedures and marketing of the schemes, as well as the setting up of a high
level group to advise on the remit of an EIC and/or on overall framework conditions for
innovation.
What would success look like?
It is too soon to say what the specific success indicators of an EIC would be. Iluustrative
examples might include:
9/17
• More 'scaled up' (€1billion plus) innovative firms founded over the previous decade
• Increase in number of innovative firms
• Increase in proportion of Europe's largest firms founded over the last 20 years
• Increase in proportion of European GDP and jobs from newly formed
industries/sectors over 10 years
3.3. DSM Cloud Initiative
What is the European Open Science Cloud?
The European Open Science Cloud will offer European researchers a virtual environment to
store, manage, analyse and re-use research data across disciplines and borders. The initiative
will be science-specific.
It is not a 'cloud made in Brussels'. It will rather federate scientific data infrastructures under a
common governance to offer dedicated data services to the wider scientific community. The
initiative aims to leverage and co-ordinate the significant public investment that has been
ongoing for more than two decades.
The initiative will also ensure that the scientific community can re-use the enormous amount
of scientific data that Horizon 2020 projects generate.
How much will Horizon 2020 contribute to the costs of the European Cloud Initiative?
Over its entire lifetime, we estimate that Horizon 2020 may contribute
over €2 billion to the
European Cloud Initiative. This includes relevant actions in 2014-15, direct actions foreseen
in 2016-17 and preparations for future actions under the 2018-20 Work Programmes. The
drafting of the Horizon 2020 work programmes for 2018-20 and the input of Member States
will help fine-tune the financial requirements of all actions foreseen in the Communication for
the European Cloud Initiative.
What are the potential benefits for the industry from the European Open Science Cloud?
To answer this, we need to take note that the ‘industry’ in fact includes very different
players in terms of size, needs and capacity. There may be different benefits for differ
ent
stakeholders. Some examples include for instance the fact that the initiative will foster a
much better flow of research data that is directly relevant for R&I cooperation and
partnerships between academia and industry. Industrial data will assist scientists (e.g.
emissions), while scientific data will help industry
(too many to list). Moreover, in specific
industrial sectors, the industry may help with the definition of standards of data
interoperability (e.g. IoT data). The industry is very important for on the job training of data
scientists - that cannot end with formal higher education, and to address the current EU data
skills shortage. A constant and 2-way flux of data competences is needed between the two.
10/17
The OI2 Conference is held under the label of the Dutch EU Presidency, and co-organised by
OISPG, DG CONNECT, the European Committee of the Regions, the City of Amsterdam,
the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences and Intel Labs Europe. The conference is
expected to gather more than 350 people and discuss topics like European Innovation Living
labs; Innovation Ecosystems; OI2 funding opportunities under Horizon 2020; Online
Engagement Platforms (Big Data, Cloud, IoT, participatory design), etc.
5.3 European Open Science Cloud
On 19 April 2016, the Commission adopted Communication on the 'European Cloud
Initiative'. The Communication presents the Commission vision and blueprint for cloud-based
services and world-class data infrastructure to ensure science, business and public services
reap benefits of big data revolution.
The European Cloud Initiative aims to develop a
trusted, open environment for the
scientific community for storing, sharing and re-using scientific data and results: the
European Open Science Cloud (EOSC). Underpinning this, the European Data Infrastructure
(EDI) aims to deploy the super-computing capacity, fast connectivity and high-capacity cloud
solutions required by the EOSC.
• The public and private investment needed to implement the European Cloud Initiative
is estimated at
€6.7 billion.
• The Commission estimates that, overall,
€2 billion in Horizon 2020 funding will be
allocated to the European Cloud initiative, to federate key infrastructures, to create the
'cloud' layer and to make scientific data open by default.
• The estimation of the required additional public and private investment for the
European Data Infrastructure is
€4.7 billion in the period of 5 years.
The European Cloud Initiative will make it easier for researchers and innovators to access and
re-use data, and will reduce the cost of data storage and high-performance analysis.
Making research data openly available can help boost Europe's competitiveness by benefitting
start-ups, SMEs and data-driven innovation, including in the fields of medicine and public
health. It can even spur new industries, as demonstrated by the Human Genome Project.
5.4 European Innovation Council
Your ambition to set up a European Innovation Council (EIC) as a 'major element of the
Horizon 2020 mid-term review' falls under the 'maximise impact' strand of the open
innovation component of your 3'O's priorities.
There is growing interest in the EIC concept among stakeholders. The online Call for Ideas
generated 1003 responses in total and numerous position papers. RTD are currently analysing
the responses, with a view to publishing online a factual 'feedback statement' in June 2016.
Prior to developing a full concept for a European Innovation Council as part of the package of
legislative proposals for the next Framework Programme, it is proposed to launch an
experimental pilot in the latter stages of Horizon 2020 (i.e. in the 2018-20 strategic
programming period), following its interim evaluation. A pilot would exploit the flexibilities
13/17
provided by the current legislation, avoiding a need for formal proposals requiring lengthy co-
decision procedures.
The key policy objective of an 'EIC pilot' would be to test new approaches that would foster
disruptive, market-creating innovations. The scope of a pilot could cover four broad action
lines:
1) awareness and information for innovators;
2) specific support for disruptive innovation, notably by adapting the SME instrument
and inclusion of inducement prizes;
3) support for scaling-up (especially through InnovFin products); and
4) expert external advice on policy.
Facts and Figures on Call for Ideas
• 1003 responses in total
- [30%] from businesses and [47%] from research stakeholders
- [80%] agree that disruptive market - creating innovation is an issue the EIC
should do something about; [75%] agree that there are gaps in current EU support
Some excerpts from replies:
"[The lack of disruptive market-creating innovation] is a fundamental problem in Europe.
There needs to be more and better routes to innovation."
"… I think the main problem is accessing and knowing about the help that already exists."
"Reduce paperwork and admin load on SMEs/Start-ups."
"Better information for the different schemes, a way people can learn if a specific instrument
is for them, remove the obstacle of "hidden information" behind rules or calls."
"It remains difficult for the private sector, especially SMEs, to get involved in EU funding
opportunities. Minimising bureaucracy would help."
"Have intuitive and simple programs across various accelerators and hubs in Europe, using a
step-by-step approach."
"Work closer with entrepreneurs rather than with governing bodies. Entrepreneurs know the
harsh realities of innovation..."
"….we need to foster and widely disseminate a culture of innovation, entrepreneurship and
failure-acceptance to the industry, universities and pupils. We need to give them as early as
possible in their learning age an appealing vision of what technology, engineering and science
is about…"
"There are far too many different EU finance channels."
14/17
5.5 ICT Standardisation Priorities for the Digital Single Market
Standardisation is a critical element of the digital single market, and by its facilitating role in
interoperability it is inevitable for the successful merger of physical and digital. However, the
current standard-setting pace in Europe is a major barrier for digitally-enabled innovation and
the creation of new markets. Despite this unfavourable situation the EU contributes to
standard-setting funding with €20M on an annual basis against industry funding of €1B. The
low level of normative EU contribution is somewhat balanced by Horizon 2020 support: in
the Work Programme 2016-17 the overall ratio of topics explicitly promoting and/or
mentioning standardisation activities among topics under LEITs and Societal Challenges is
approximately 25%.
Most of the EU's main trading partners, and notably some large emerging economies, have
recognised the importance of standard-setting as a means to achieve market access and to
boost the competitiveness of their industrial players. By publishing a Communication on
Priorities of ICT Standardisation on 19 April the EU is also developing political signal.
The Communication identifies six priority domains for the next wave of standardisation: 5G
Communications, Cloud Computing, the Internet of Things (IoT), Big Data technologies,
Cybersecurity and digitalisation of industry. Three sectoral domains: health care, connected
vehicles and smart energy have been suggested as areas that could substantially benefit from
standardisation.
The Communication proposes a high level process to guarantee the impact of prioritised
actions. This has 5 elements:
• validation of priorities and raising efficiency of the standard-setting process in Europe,
• regularly reviewing and monitoring progress,
• better leveraging the EU support to ICT priority standardisation,
• ensuring fair and non-discriminatory access,
• fostering the EU presence in the international dialogue and cooperation on ICT
standards.
15/17
7. SOCIAL MEDIA
Intel Labs Europe: @IntelLabsEurope
Open Innovation Strategy and Policy Group: @OISPG
European Open Science Could: #EOSC
#openinnovation
#EU_EIC
Discussing European Open Science Cloud #EOSC and #EU_EIC with
,
@IntelLabsEurope @OISPG
ADD picture with
17/17