European Innovation Act takes key actions on public procurement, but sidesteps careers, mobility and universities’ unique role

The persistent scaling gap for European innovators due to regulatory and financial issues has long been identified as a constraint in the translation of scientific results into new products, services and solutions. With the Innovation Act, Europe is now signalling its intention to address the equally significant gap in pre-commercialisation. As accurately noted in the text, public procurement is an essential tool in this regard, helping to improve the quality and efficiency of public services, address societal challenges and build industrial capacity. The European University Association hopes that the principles and procedures outlined in the Act will enable public authorities to effectively procure a wide variety of innovative solutions, many of them originating from university-based innovators.

At the same time, the proposed regulation does not always live up to its goal of ‘strengthening the Union innovation ecosystem’, as stated in its title, by failing to leverage the full spectrum of elements that form the very core of such ecosystems.

As EUA has previously highlighted in its input to the preparation of the Act, Europe needs a shared innovation culture that rewards the wide-ranging contributions of innovators through flexible, supportive career frameworks. For example, two-way mobility of students and staff between companies and universities is an important tool to boost Europe’s innovation capacity, yet administrative and regulatory barriers still remain which hamper this process. The Act does not address these.

Moreover, a place-based approach to innovation is missing from the proposal. Such an approach can facilitate the crucial lifeline connecting innovative ideas and entrepreneurial staff and students at universities with the surrounding ecosystem of startups and scaleups. Yet, although universities are often the anchor institutions of such dynamic local interactions, the Act does not recognise their role as a long-term ecosystem builder.

As the first major piece of EU legislation dedicated to innovation, the Innovation Act could have been a more substantial attempt to devise systemic measures in support of the transition from knowledge creation to commercialisation. The establishment of a competence centre for intellectual property-backed finance, as well as the development of a Union-wide IP valuation framework and a digital IP marketplace, are nevertheless welcome.

Universities would benefit from guidance and examples, in order to upgrade their internal IP regulations so as to achieve the best outcomes in negotiations with investors and academic inventors. EUA therefore calls for a clear articulation of the Innovation Act and the blueprint for IP licensing announced in the Startup and Scaleup Strategy. The Association is ready to mobilise universities’ innovation expertise for an effective co-creation process with all relevant stakeholders.