EU Research Commissioner Carlos Moedas is now moving ahead with his plan to create a European Innovation Council (EIC), to act as a one stop shop for innovation and bring order to the widely dispersed innovation competitions running under the Horizon 2020 R&D programme.

A wide range of ideas are up for discussion, including a suggestion that the new council should command similar resources to the ERC and hand out individual grants, or that its role should be a narrower advisory function. 

In 2010, the EIC appears in a European Association of Research and Technology Organisation (EARTO) policy document as a body with, “the task of providing strategic, independent advice and guidance” to the Research Commissioner. More recently, EARTO published an expanded vision for the EIC in December 2015: http://www.earto.eu/fileadmin/content/Website_2/EARTO_Paper_-_European_Innovation_Council.pdf  

In the document, EARTO strongly supports the European Commission  in  setting  up  a  European Innovation  Council  (EIC)  as  a  new encompassing  and  strong  framework for EU innovation policy, the same way that the ERC turned out to be one of the most effective  frameworks of Europe’s science policy. The ERC supports excellent  research, the  EIC  should support excellent innovation.

The  EIC  should  be  focused  on how to bring  research  results  to  the  market (i.e.  crossing  the  valley  of  death) and how to ensure a full deployment of new technological opportunities by European industry to generate impact, keep and create jobs and  economic growth in Europe.

More info about the EIC is here.

Illustrative photo, source: flickr.com/Maryland GovPics