Foreword HORIZON 2020 Projects: Portal
Rudolf Haggenmüller
Chairman of the EUREKA Cluster programme ITEA
I am delighted to be given the opportunity to address the readers of Horizon 2020 Projects: Portal in the spring of 2015, as this year in July, the EUREKA Network will be celebrating its 30th anniversary. EUREKA was established in 1985 to foster European R&D co-operation and to strengthen the competitiveness of European industry based on the national priorities of its member countries. Aside from developing EUREKA individual projects, Umbrellas and the Eurostars programme, each of which offers opportunities to smaller consortia with fewer partners to develop innovative technologies, EUREKA has also understood the critical need for a focus on business-oriented innovation in major high technology domains to maintain the competitiveness of European industry. Consequently, in 1987, JESSI, the first EUREKA ‘strategic initiative’ – later to be known as a ‘EUREKA Cluster’ – was born, and its success led to the endorsement of further clusters. Together, these EUREKA Clusters now represent 70% of the budget of the EUREKA portfolio and in total have leveraged €14.9bn in R&D efforts since the network’s inception.
The EUREKA Clusters have created with their partners (large companies, SMEs, research organisations, academia, user organisations), and with the strong support of public authorities, an important organisational ecosystem and a unique network for pan-European co-operation, which is ready to respond to any new challenge. The bottom-up approach and the flexibility embedded in EUREKA and in the clusters allow industry to react quickly and efficiently to any changing parameter; this approach is compatible with market push so that innovation can always be at the leading edge whilst allowing for fast market deployment. Today, ITEA is recognised as the EUREKA Cluster on software innovation. In 2013, we published our joint ITEA-ARTEMIS Vision 2030 report with a focus on the role of software innovation in the coming period, a time full of change and disruption. As we reported together with ARTEMIS, we are addressing a global market of 2.6 trillion US dollars (~€2.4tr), corresponding to 44 million jobs. For Europe, an industry strong in software innovation is a prerequisite for maintaining global competitiveness and in securing high-value jobs in digital technology and in other, more traditional industries that are dependent on digital technology.
The ITEA programme, now in its third instalment, known as ITEA 3, builds on the foundations of ITEA 1 and 2. However, at the same time, it is radically different from previous approaches to research and innovation. ITEA 3 represents an agile organisation with an ISO 9001:2008 quality management system in place to ensure adaptability to the forthcoming changes in industry, and has created a living roadmap to support the launch of new ITEA projects as a continually updated baseline for innovation. The programme is strengthening its software innovation power through increasingly globalised strategies, including customers and end users in its software innovation projects, and addressing talent development in its projects on company and country levels. EUREKA Clusters, including ITEA, are complementary to other European programmes like Horizon 2020 and the joint technology initiatives. These programmes are more oriented to general research and innovation, whereas EUREKA Clusters clearly focus on short to medium term market impact.
Research and innovation in Europe has to become more global and digital; EUREKA and especially ITEA may act as frontrunners for this development. Through their flexibility and adaptability, the EUREKA Clusters are well equipped to consider more global approaches and the involvement of customers and end users. EUREKA, with its instrument of association, may take the lead in this globalisation. However, for the digitalisation of R&I, the lead will be with the financing instruments. This journal may be considered as the initiation of a new generation of European research and innovation. The partners highlighted in this edition should take up the signal: three years from now, global and digital R&I in Europe must be in place.
I wish the readers prudent reading and passionate afterthought.