A blueprint for transforming EU industry through place-based innovation
Industrial policy is once again in vogue in public policy circles around the world. Yet it is crucial to ensure coherence between place-based innovation and EU industrial policy. For doing so, this contribution proposes a backcasting, mission-oriented and foresight-inspired approach to sustainable, resilient and secure development in the EU. It encourages the EU to fully […]
Following July’s CrowdStrike outage, this is how we can avoid the next ‘Blue Friday’
On 19 July, the world experienced ‘Blue Friday’ when 8.5 million PC screens worldwide were hit by the infamous Blue Screen of Death (BSOD), a critical error message displayed by Microsoft Windows when the system encounters a serious issue that it cannot recover from. This unprecedented outage was triggered by a faulty update from CrowdStrike, […]
Turbocharging Europe’s innovative SMEs
Innovative small and medium-sized enterprises (ISMEs) are not scaled-down versions of large, listed companies. They differ fundamentally in their position in and contribution to the economy and society. It’s thus unlikely that the corporate legal structures, governance and management models for large companies are suitable for ISMEs. To improve the EU’s competitiveness, it’s essential to […]
Europe must act now to bridge regional divides and halt political extremism
Political discontent is rising in Europe and the EU is facing a complex challenge – improving competitiveness while simultaneously preventing the growth of regional inequalities. Unleashing competitiveness means taking concrete actions to give Europe the lead in complex technologies such as AI, to unleash innovation and entrepreneurship but also to correct a false narrative that […]
Venezuela’s election shows that technology can be democracy’s ally – and not only an enemy
Digital technology is often accused of enabling surveillance and abuse. From China’s Big Brother social credit system to Silicon Valley’s surveillance capitalism, experts have warned of the enormous power that governments and large platforms can gain by controlling online content. Yet it would be a mistake to call the technology itself responsible. Rather, its malicious […]
Towards a European large-scale initiative on Artificial Intelligence
While being a leading world region when it comes to regulating Artificial Intelligence (AI), Europe has accumulated delays in creating a fertile ecosystem for investment and innovation in this crucial domain for economic competitiveness, strategic autonomy and democratic resilience. To remedy this situation, several proposals have been presented for an ambitious initiative that catalyses research […]
Europe can produce its own tech giants — here’s how
Why does the EU fail to produce its own Google, Amazon or Facebook? Is Europe lacking entrepreneurship, technical savvy or simply imagination? Contrary to what many think, the EU does even better than the US at creating high-tech start-ups; however, many European firms whither on the vine due to a lack of finance. Yet a […]
Digital aspects of the EU Single Market
The Single Market is essential both for internal cohesion and for the EU’s global competitiveness versus the United States and China. It seeks to ensure and enable the free flow of services, goods, capital and people within the EU/EEA; however, none of these four traditional dimensions of the Single Market have been fully achieved – […]
The Open Data Maturity Ranking is shoddy – it badly needs to be re-thought
Digitalising government is essential for Europe’s future innovation and economic growth and one of the keys to achieving this is open data – information that public entities gather, create, or fund, and it’s accessible to all to freely use. This includes everything from public budget details to transport schedules. Open data’s benefits are vast — […]